Tuesday 16 June 2015

OKIS progress update

The aim of this blogsite was to provide us (the research team) with a way of engaging with people who might be interested in our research project from the start. It will also play a major role in helping us disseminate the final results: but we have a bit to go yet.

The main ‘output’ of our work will be an NIHR HTA report. This report contains details of everything we have done, including the methods, the results and our conclusions from the systematic review, the patient interviews and the survey of health professionals.  We then take an overall view of the results and interpret what we have found in a concluding discussion section and consider what the implications might be for clinical practice and for further research.

The report than has a considerable journey of its own: the draft we have just finished has gone out to our Advisory group members for their comments and suggestions. We then address any issues they raise, before submitting the report to our funders, NIHR HTA programme. They have a team of editors who check the report and send it out to some external, independent experts for peer review. This means every aspect of the report will be examined to ensure that we have done everything we agreed to do when granted the funding, that we presented our methods and results clearly and precisely, and that our discussion and implications sections are appropriate and supported by the work we have done.  The comments of the peer reviewers will be sent to us and addressed before the report is finally returned to NIHR HTA programme to be published in the NIHR Journals Library.

While the report is out for peer review, we will be working on other dissemination outputs. This includes drafting a summary report, a number of blog posts and some academic journal papers. Once the peer comments have been addressed and any necessary changes also made to these other outputs, we will be able to make the findings available. All these other formats will aim to present the essence of the full report in brief and in lay language so everyone understands the findings and implications.

Thanks for your patience, be assured that we will make sure you get to know the findings as soon as possible – just watch this space!

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