Article type
Year
Abstract
Background: Active involvement of people with a health condition may enhance the usefulness of systematic review evidence, addressing barriers to uptake of review findings. Challenges to the development of effective methods of involvement within reviews are compounded by poor description and limited evaluation of involvement within many reviews.
Objectives: To describe the structured methods used to involve stroke survivors, carers and health professionals in an update of a Cochrane Systematic Review relating to physiotherapy after stroke, and explore the perceived impact of involvement.
Methods: After securing relevant funding and ethical approval, we recruited stroke survivors, carers, physiotherapists and educators, and held three pre-planned meetings during a Cochrane Review update. We used formal group consensus methods, based on nominal group techniques, to reach consensus decisions on key issues relating to the structure and methods of the review. Meetings were audio-recorded, and transcribed data used to supplement data on voting decisions. User-group members completed a questionnaire exploring perceived impact of involvement.
Results: The user-group comprised 13 people, including stroke survivors, carers and physiotherapists with a range of different professional experience. At Meeting 1 consensus was reached that the methods of categorising interventions used in the original Cochrane Review were no longer appropriate or clinically relevant (11/13 participants disagreed with previous categories). At Meeting 2 group members discussed and reached consensus over a new method of intervention categorisation (12/12 agreed) and at Meeting 3 key messages emerging from the completed review were agreed. All participants strongly agreed that the views of the group impacted beneficially on the review update. They further believed that other Cochrane Reviews would benefit from involvement of a similar user-group.
Conclusions: We involved stroke survivors and carers in reaching consensus decisions relating to our review by adopting clearly described, structured methods. We believe that this approach has important implications for future Cochrane Reviews.
Objectives: To describe the structured methods used to involve stroke survivors, carers and health professionals in an update of a Cochrane Systematic Review relating to physiotherapy after stroke, and explore the perceived impact of involvement.
Methods: After securing relevant funding and ethical approval, we recruited stroke survivors, carers, physiotherapists and educators, and held three pre-planned meetings during a Cochrane Review update. We used formal group consensus methods, based on nominal group techniques, to reach consensus decisions on key issues relating to the structure and methods of the review. Meetings were audio-recorded, and transcribed data used to supplement data on voting decisions. User-group members completed a questionnaire exploring perceived impact of involvement.
Results: The user-group comprised 13 people, including stroke survivors, carers and physiotherapists with a range of different professional experience. At Meeting 1 consensus was reached that the methods of categorising interventions used in the original Cochrane Review were no longer appropriate or clinically relevant (11/13 participants disagreed with previous categories). At Meeting 2 group members discussed and reached consensus over a new method of intervention categorisation (12/12 agreed) and at Meeting 3 key messages emerging from the completed review were agreed. All participants strongly agreed that the views of the group impacted beneficially on the review update. They further believed that other Cochrane Reviews would benefit from involvement of a similar user-group.
Conclusions: We involved stroke survivors and carers in reaching consensus decisions relating to our review by adopting clearly described, structured methods. We believe that this approach has important implications for future Cochrane Reviews.