News
We were delighted to hold our first face-to-face outreach PPIE session last week in Oldham. The session was led by Professor Basma Ellahi and Jasmyn Gooding and focused on how PPIE and engagement can shape research on multiple long-term conditions, their impact on our communities, and links with inflammation and diet. The interactive session was lively and engaging, generating valuable insights into perceptions of long-term conditions and cultural nuances around definitions. These insights will help to shape the direction of the InflAIM research programme and inform shared research priorities. The strong level of interest was reflected in a full room and highly engaged discussion.
This session marks the first in a planned series of face-to-face outreach events that will engage with minority groups to ensure inclusivity within our PPIE work and, ultimately, across the wider InflAIM programme.
We are grateful to Cllr Shaid Mushtaq (PhD) from Oldham Council for attending to champion this collaborative approach and for sharing reflections on strengthening the evidence base, following his participation in the local Health and Wellbeing Board earlier that day. Building and sustaining these partnerships is essential to delivering real-world research through InflAIM that has impact and can be implemented in practice.
Thank you to Upturn Enterprise for hosting us in such excellent facilities, to Basma for being such a welcoming host, and to Jasmyn and Basma for running such a constructive session. Thanks also to Anna and Charlotte for their support on the day.
Finally, our sincere thanks to all our PPIE members. InflAIM research is strongest and most meaningful when it is created together with the communities it aims to serve.
This is the first in a series of methodological papers as part of the InflAIM programme.
The paper describes the development of a co-produced, standardised set of definitions and electronic health record codelists for multiple long-term conditions. We hope that it will be a useful resource for inflammation-focused research.
On 1 October 2025, Inflaim researchers took part in the Living with Long-Term Conditions event at the Quadram Institute, bringing together patients, researchers, and clinicians to discuss inflammation, nutrition, and long-term health.
Professor Macgregor and Stephanie Howard-Wilsher presented “Fragmentation to Integration" sharing systems research insights on managing multiple long-term conditions.
Jasmyn Gooding, our PPI Lead, highlighted the essential role of patient and public involvement in shaping meaningful research.
We were very pleased to see the NIHR ARC East of England publish our case study report on 'involving people with multiple long term conditions' on their website.
Click the link to the web page: Impact of public involvement in our research | ARC East of England
Dr Charlotte Davies, Professor Alex Macgregor, and Professor Chris Fox took part in the AIM RSF Multiple Long-Term Conditions: From Research to Reality conference in Birmingham, May 6-7th, 2025.
The event brought together researchers, policymakers, industry and patient partners to share progress and explore new collaborations, helping ensure research makes a real-world impact.
Dr Charlotte Davies presented an InflAIM poster showcasing key findings from the programme’s first year.
We held our first in-person InflAIM Programme Steering Committee meeting on the 11th March held at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
The meeting took a hybrid format and provided a fantastic opportunity to bring together our team from across the UK and share ideas, challenges and progress.
We are fortunate to have a highly experienced Steering Committee team who provided some invaluable feedback and questions. Thank you to Professor Johnathan Valabjhi (PSC Chair, National Clinical Lead for Multiple Long-Term Conditions at NHS England), Professor David Hand (Emeritus Professor of Mathematics and Senior Research Investigator at Imperial College), Professor Farzad Amirabdollahian (Professor of Nutrition and Public Health) Jane Taylor (Patient and Public Representative) and Andrea Yanez-Cunningham (Programme Manager, NIHR).
Dr Charlotte Davies, Jasmyn Gooding (Citizens Academy) and Anita Vaughn (InflAIM PPIE core group member) presented some of our PPIE work at the University of East Anglia, Citizens Academy first Annual Conference on the 28th February 2025.
This provided a valuable opportunity to hear about other research studies with strong PPIE coproduction and to gain feedback and interest on the InflAIM programme.