Collaborative research with parents: working together to get it right!

Aim: The aim of this paper is to share experiences of setting up, and working collaboratively with, a parents' panel for the purposes of developing and conducting research to improve information available for families with an acutely ill child. Discussion: Patient and public involvement in research has become a mandatory requirement in the UK for research teams seeking funding through statutory, and many non-statutory, funding agencies. This paper will share with participants the process of setting up and recruiting parents into the group, introducing them to the research proposed, and engaging with them in collaborative research endeavour from refining the proposal through to the conduct of the initial stages of the research. The perspective of parents on the panel, and those of the professionals in the research team, will be presented. Take home message: It is important to work collaboratively with service users, in this case parents of young children, within research teams for the resulting research to be both credible and valid - in other words we need to work together to get it right!