Outstanding public involvement celebrated at KERN Awards

35 nominees were shortlisted for the inaugural King’s Engaged Research Awards. Created by King’s Engaged Researcher Network (KERN), the awards aim to recognise and celebrate impactful public and community engagement with research across King’s.

ARC public involvement and engagement shortlised at the Awards included:

Researchers from the EMBED-Care team won the communicating research (local) award for their work, engaging young people about palliative dementia care research at a Science Museum event. For this event the team developed a suite of activities, collectively named ‘the D words’. Visitors were invited to take part in activities including a card game, a wishing tree, and a myth buster quiz, as well as having the opportunity to chat to the research team about dying with dementia.
Researchers and public members with lived experience won the transforming research culture award for implementing a co-developed public involvement strategy for palliative care research. The strategy has ensured that public involvement is at the core of Cicely Saunders Institute’s research culture, has led to increased diversity of members involved and increased influence at a strategic level and partnerships with local, national and international capacity in public involvement in palliative care.
Kaat De Backer, a researcher in the maternity and perinatal mental health theme and a service user advisory panel were shortlisted for the PhD/Early Career Research award. The MUMS@RISC study focuses on maternity experiences and outcomes of mothers separated from their babies due to social care proceedings. The advisory panel consists of mothers with lived experience of infant removal. Their trauma-informed approaches to research engagement has led to a Charter for Research Engagement
The Maternity Opportunities for Research Engagement (MORE) project team was shortlisted for a King’s Engaged Research Award in the Participatory Research (local) category. The participatory research project is focused on building greater understanding of the needs and experiences of an ethnically and socially diverse group of women in south London.

Photos by Jack Latimer.

Photo: Prof Catherine Evans (left), King's College London and Marion Sumerfield (centre), public involvement member and Sarah Crabtree, research assistant, Cicely Saunders Institute (CSI) receiving their award for transforming research culture.

This is a real honour to be awarded one of the first KERN Awards. Collaboration in research is at the heart of how the CSI works with patients, their families, carers and those close to them. It is focused on providing better support for everyone when they need Palliative and End of Life Care. We welcome anyone who would like to contribute to our shared work at CSI Public Involvement Forum or you can contact csi.ppi@kcl.ac.uk

Marion Sumerfield, public involvement member, CSI

Photo: Sarah Crabtree, Catherine Evans and Emel Yorganci, EMBED-Care, palliative and end of life care researcher team.

This award has only been made possible through the dedicated collaboration between staff and public members over many years.

Sarah Crabtree, research assistant and public involvement, Cicely Saunders Institute, King's College London

It was touching to see the astonishment and incredulity with which the winners accepted their [King's Engaged Research] Awards. This showed the humility of people who invest so much effort in research that truly matters to people. We felt proud to have made the shortlist and humbled to be in such company.

Vita Moltedo, peer researcher, project team for the MORE study

Photo: The maternity and perinatal mental health theme from left (Mary Newburn, Tania Sutedja, Vita Moltedo, Zenab Barry, Abigail Easter, Kaat de Backer, Jane Sandall and Zoe Vowles.

Read more about the King’s Engaged Researcher Network