How many of you have arrived at a meeting, gasping for a cup of tea, and been presented with a scene not unlike the one in the photo below?

An array of coffee pots.  All looking the same. But each holding something different. Coffee, decaffeinated coffee, hot water, tea (possibly). That’s before we even get to the white stuff. Milk, cream, semi–skimmed, soya, half-and-half. And so it goes on.

Yes, I know they are sometimes labelled. But not always. Many times the writing has been worn off. So there!

If you’re like me, you often arrive at events a bit harried and with the spatial awareness of someone coming out of an operation. So you plump for coffee, promptly pick the wrong pot and pour hot water into a cup. What to do? Hide the cup somewhere where no one will see it. Drink it – yuk! Or make the best of a bad situation and make a cup of tea which you didn’t really want. Now, where’s the English Breakfast tea bag among all those hippie herbal ones?

I suspect organisations, their staff and the patients, carers and the public can feel like this when confronted with public involvement. Where do we start? How should we do it? What does good look like? How do we know if we are doing well? Who says? What do we do if pour from the wrong PPI font of knowledge? Is there hope?

This very real challenge was recognised in the ‘Going the Extra Mile’ report and recommendations which was published following NIHR’s Strategic Review of public involvement in research.  Recommendation 2 said:

‘The NIHR should commission the development of a set of values, principles and standards for public involvement. These must be co-produced with the public and other partners. They should be framed in such a way, and with a clear set of self-assessment criteria, so that organisations across the NIHR see their adoption as integral to their continuous improvement in public involvement. The achievements of the public, staff and researchers in promoting and advancing public involvement should be celebrated and acknowledged by the NIHR.’

Now, the NIHR and it’s colleagues in the other nations of the UK ( a significant achievement in itself)  – the Public Health Agency in Northern Ireland, the Chief Scientist Office in Scotland, and Health and Care Research Wales – have launched a set of draft standards for public involvement for consultation.  The draft standards which have been developed from INVOLVE’s values and principles work a few years ago are as follows:

1.Inclusive opportunities – We provide clear, meaningful and accessible opportunities for involvement, for a wide range of people across all research.

2.Working together – We create and sustain respectful relationships, policies, practices and environments for effective working in research.

3.Support & learning – We ensure public involvement is undertaken with confidence and competence by everyone.

4.Communications – We provide clear and regular communications as part of all involvement plans and activities

5.Impact – We assess report and act on the impact of involving the public in research.

6.Governance – We ensure the community of interest voices are heard, valued, and included in decision making.

Now it’s your chance to shape and influence these standards and the indicators of good practice for each which have been developed by NIHR staff, researchers and public contributors over the last year and about which I have written before.

The excellent consultation web page has more details and resources explaining the draft standards, the indicators of good practice as well as information on how they were developed. It also provides slides and tools if you are planning to hold your own consultation event – I hope you do, it might be fun. There’s also a downloadable copy of the consultation questionnaire; if you want to go straight to the online survey you can do so here.  And the Welsh language version is here.

As the Academy of Medical Sciences recent said in its report on society and evidence, it’s time for health research organisations to wake up and smell the coffee when it comes to public involvement.

So this is an incredibly important milestone in the development of public involvement by the Government health research agencies across the UK. The standards will help all organisations to develop and embed public involvement, adopt good practice and measure progress in a constructive way.

The consultation ends on 1 September 2017 and there will be news on the next stage of their development at the INVOLVE conference on 28th November.

Over to you.

Have a good weekend.