Ways you can get involved
There are lots of different ways you can get involved with research. Find out more about the ways to get involved in research through the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) and how you could help change people's lives.
Getting involved in research
It is important for the public to take part in research. This is called public involvement. Public involvement in research is being carried out 'with' or 'by' the public rather than ‘to’, ‘about’ or ‘for’ them.
You might not want to take part in a health and care research study. However, that doesn’t mean you can’t support health and care research! Your knowledge from having experienced care, or the care of others, is of great value to researchers.
When the public gets involved in research, they work alongside researchers to help shape:
- what research gets completed
- how it’s carried out
- and how the results are shared and applied in practice
Being involved is not the same as taking part in a trial or study to test a new treatment or care option. It is about being a member of the research team that works together to design and run the study.
Be Part of Research
We can make faster improvements to people's health and care if more people take part in research. There are a range of reasons that people choose to participate in research:
- To improve health and social care for others, as well as giving hope for future generations
- To learn more about their condition
- To try a new treatment or device
- To be more closely and regularly monitored by health and care professionals
- To help researchers learn important new information
Be Part of Research helps match you to research studies. Anyone over 16 years old can take part in research; you do not have to have a health condition. The research can take place at a local hospital, GP practice, care setting or at home.
Once you have signed up online, you will be sent the details of approved studies that match your interests. You can then decide if you want to take part.
Research Interest Database (RESIDE)
RESIDE is a way for residents in Norfolk to get involved in research. It is a secure mailing list for research participation. Whenever a research project relevant to you is available, we will contact you. You can then decide if you want to take part in the research project.
Please be aware, RESIDE is currently only available to residents in Norfolk.
It is a secure database. It was previously held at Norfolk Community Health and Care NHS Trust (NCH&C). We will only contact you about research projects that might be suitable for you.
When you sign up, a member of our research team will call you within 2 weeks. We will ask you questions to help us understand more about you. This helps us to understand what research projects are suitable for you. After the call, we will send you an email or letter to thank you and give you our contact details.
Sometimes, there won't be research projects that are suitable for you for some time. If there are no suitable projects for a year, we will contact you to check that you still want to stay on RESIDE. If we can't reach you by phone, we will try by email or letter. If we do not hear back from you, we will take your details off RESIDE.
If you no longer want to be part of RESIDE, let us know and we will remove you.
Contact us using the contact details provided to you.
You can also let us know when we contact you for projects. Tell us that you want to be removed and we will remove you.
Join dementia research
Join dementia research focuses on dementia research. They match you to local and national dementia research studies. The research can be in-person or online.
Taking part in dementia research will make a real difference to the future of dementia care, diagnosis and treatment.
Research newsletter
"Getting involved in research!" is an NIHR newsletter covering local news and updates about health and social care research in the East of England. It covers Cambridgeshire, Bedfordshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk and Suffolk.
This newsletter is open to the public, you do not have to be a researcher or health professional to sign-up.
