Healthy childhoods will be one of the five research themes for the new NIHR Applied Research Collaboration West (ARC West).
This is good news for the Generation R Young People’s Advisory Group (YPAG) based in Bristol as it guarantees ongoing support for the next five years.
The group is made up of young people aged between 10 and 18 and offers an opportunity for young people to critically evaluate the way research about them takes place. For researchers, it’s a chance to have their research ideas, information sheets or questionnaires checked by the people who they are planning to research. The group meets in central Bristol six times a year, providing an opportunity for up to four researchers to use their services each time.
The ARC announcement has given People in Health West of England, ARC West’s patient and public involvement partners, fresh impetus to start a recruitment drive with an emphasis on making sure the YPAG is as representative of the general population as possible. This is already paying off with more boys (historically more difficult to recruit than girls), a more ethnically diverse group and more people travelling into central Bristol from the suburbs and as far away as Weston-super-Mare.
If you are between the ages of 10 and 18 and think you might be interested in joining the group, contact Mike Bell on mike.bell@bristol.ac.uk. No experience is needed (except experience of being a young person), you get paid and it’s a great opportunity to make new friends and influence research.