Learning from Greater Manchester’s People and Communities During the COVID-19 Pandemic
In collaboration with Health Innovation Manchester, we are delighted to be working with a range of public contributors as part of our Public and Community Involvement and Engagement (PCIE) Panel, and the new Greater Manchester PCIE Forum to help design, align and enact key research activity across Greater Manchester.
Engaging and involving with our public contributors and Greater Manchester community is essential to ARC-GM as Sue Wood (Head of ARC-GM Operations) outlines:
“There has never been a more important time to ensure that we are listening to our public members and the people who support them, our work with HInM, our panel and the forum has given us the ability to reach out across GM in ways that would not have been possible on our own.”
The current COVID-19 pandemic has affected our daily lives in different ways, with many of the things that we used to take for granted just not being possible at the moment. We’ve all had to adapt and adjust the ways in which we live and work; this has meant that we’ve had to communicate with our PCIE panel and the Greater Manchester PCIE Forum in new ways.
Professor Caroline Sanders, (Lead for Public and Community Involvement and Engagement for ARC-GM) explains how crucial engagement and discussion with members of the Greater Manchester PCIE Forum has been during recent months.
“The forum brings together leadership for public involvement and engagement from across Greater Manchester organisations and communities focusing on health, care and well-being. It has been a platform for sharing experiences and learning during the pandemic, especially concerning inequalities for marginalised and seldom heard communities."
“The forum has been a platform for our formal system organisations (including universities, NHS organisations) to learn from the fantastic innovation within our voluntary sector organisations and networks that have joined us to work together.
“Our online community has rapidly generated new partnerships and activities to address major challenges faced during the COVID-19 pandemic, including how to maximise diversity and inclusion; how to address social isolation and digital inequalities; and how to coproduce appropriate services and innovations.”
You can read all about the learning around the key challenges faced during the COVID-19 pandemic from the Greater Manchester PCIE Forum from here
If you would like to get involved or know more about either the PCIE Panel and or the Greater Manchester PICE Forum, please look at the information on our website here or alternatively contact:
• Nicky Timmis Nicky.Timmis@healthinnovationmanchester.com about the Panel
• Aneela McAvoy Aneela.McAvoy@healthinnovationmanchester.com for the Forum