A personal view of the challenges in coproducing a Health Inequalities Conference Workshop (Health Services Research UK Conference, July, 2021). Considering expectations and actualisation.

By the ARC NWC Health Equity Mainstreaming Strategy (HEMS) Public Advisers Group.

We work as a team to implement equity in all activities across ARC NWC. This conference was our first as a group. We learnt that we need to look at how we continue the work after conferences end, move over the cliff edge to continue our powerful message

Neil Joseph, Presenter: So many months had passed between the original abstract submission to the day, when finally, we were due to present our work and host a 40-minute workshop at the July 2021 HSR UK Conference.

We opted to combine digital graphics, slides and pre-recorded introductions with live presentations, real time Q&A’s followed by breakout rooms, facilitated by public advisers.

The group had recently been augmented by the addition of 2 new HEMS PA’s who, despite not being able to attend the 3 day conference, were selfless, creative, quick to adapt and integral in deciding and honing the content for the day.

The amount of passion, energy commitment, integrity and time that had been invested filled each of us with confidence!

Despite the technical issues around logging in for conference presenters, our introduction, courtesy of the wonderful Paula Wheeler was incisive, provocative, challenging and set the tone perfectly. The also wonderful Dr Ana Porroche’ Escudero kindly introduced the next section, a detailed description of how deeply embedded the ARC NWC Public Adviser model is at ALL stages, not only through Public Led Research, through to Project Implementation and dissemination, but at all strategic governance levels.

Even though the sound quality took a serious nose dive toward the 4th quarter of the live spoken script, colleagues were supportive of the Public Adviser presenting having limited access to broadband connectivity. A not so subtle hint at digital inclusion being dependent on socio economic status. Mind the gap, indeed! “

Alan Griffiths, Workshop moderator – I was nervous about running a breakout room before the conference began, but once it started I was fine. Ana and Neil’s presentations were great. They brought back memories of a lot of hard work carried out by our HI sub group. We had built up quite a momentum and were planning to attend so many conferences and seminars before COVID 19. So the HSR UK conference was our first one since the beginning of the pandemic!

Moving on from CLAHRC NWC to ARC NWC in the meantime, the emphasis of our work also moved from raising awareness about health inequalities to embedding health equity in everything we do. We believe that with a positive approach we can be more effective.

The time in the breakout room itself was sadly cut short due to technical issues. I was moved from room to room until I eventually found myself in a room with four or five other delegates. We talked about the presentations, which had been well received, and about evaluating public advisers’ involvement. Everyone thought public involvement was essential and extremely valuable, and that our work on health inequalities and equity was a good example of that.

Afterwards we met as a group for a virtual ‘feedback’ session and there was a real buzz in the camp. We believe that we achieved what we set out to do, which was not only to tell everybody about HI and our HEMS but to show how PAs can be effective in the co-production – and delivery – of such a powerful message.
—
View the ARC NWC HSR UK session: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gbnd2eSYiiY