Consumer and community involvement program

The CCI program facilitates strong consumer involvement and is committed to a sustainable program to support consumer and community involvement in health and medical research across Women’s Health.

An icon of three figures and a lightbulb above their heads'

Sub-committee Chaired by Cathy Leane (Consumer)

This program is led by the Consumer and Community Involvement (CCI) Sub-committee working to engage Consumer Advisor/Advocates in all WHRTN activities, a National Consumer Network and embedding co-production in all research projects.  AHRA's National CCI Committee took part in developing the WHRTN CCI strategy and implementation plan.

The program facilitates strong consumer involvement and is committed to a sustainable program to support medical research.

Diagram of four WHRTN programs with CCI highlighted in yellow.

WHRTN Consumer and Community Involvement Training Resource - Download the Training Resource
This resource provides training to increase knowledge of consumer and community involvement (CCI) in women’s health and medical research for consumers (Section 1), for researchers and healthcare professionals in women’s health (Section 2).

Vision, Values and Principles

Vision

  • CCI is intrinsic to and embedded in the operations and activities of the WHRTN.

  • CCI reflects a genuine sharing of power, a mutual trust and a shared belief in its value and is world leading.

Values

  • Consumers and community members add meaningful value to all phases of health and medical research.

  • The translation of health and medical research is enhanced by the involvement of consumers and community members.

Principles

  • Considers women in their lived environment including social determinants of health

  • CCI is vital in co-design and drives and enables translation of prioritised health and medical research

  • Researchers, health professionals and consumer and community members are supported through policy, training and resources

  • Health literacy, empowerment and equity across all groups including sustained focus on underserved groups: culturally and linguistically diverse (CaLD) Indigenous, gender diverse, and those in rural and regional areas

  • Implementation of CCI is informed by the collective and accumulated expertise of AHRA members and our CCI community and draws from international experience

  • CCI learnings are shared across the WHRTN and broader AHRA network

  • A sustainable business model in CCI will be developed.

Activities to date

Consumer Advisors across WHRTN committees

  • WHRTN currently has 12 Consumer Advisors sitting across its steering committee and 4 Sub-Committees.

Co-Production Grants

  • Working with the Research Sub-C to award Academic and Consumer-led grants across WHRTN’s 9 priority areas.

Engage with Underserved Populations

  • Working with our Consumer Advisor/ Advocates. Develop a working group too increase consumer voices from underrepresented populations.

National Women's Health CCI Alliance

  • Collaborating with the Australian Women’s Health Alliance (AHWA) to form a National Women’s Health CCI Alliance.

Resources

  • CCI Training Resource - Developed for Researchers, Health Professionals and Consumers.

  • Download the resource

Sub-committee Membership

  • Ms Katie Allen (Consumer Advisor/Advocate)

  • Ms Leslie Arnott (CPL)

  • Ms Tammy Milne (Consumer Advisor/Advocate)

  • Ms Thit Tieu (Consumer Advisor/Advocate)

  • Ms Romy Listo (AWHA representative)

  • Ms Amie Armstrong (WHRTN CCI Project Manager)

  • Professor Deb Loxton (NSW Regional Health Partners)

  • Associate Prof Jacqueline Boyle (Monash Partners)

  • Professor Gita Mishra (Health Translation Queensland)

  • Professor Janette Perz (SPHERE)

  • Ms Debra Langridge (Consumer Advisor/Advocate)

  • Ms Eman Al-Dasuqi (Consumer Advisor/Advocate)