Creative approaches to communicating research Doing it differently! Gillian Southgate NHS R&D North West

1. Gillian Southgate
Sept 2014

2. CREATIVE WARM UP!

4. NHS RESEARCH & DEVELOPMENT NW
• The NHS R&D NW team run a creative communications programme of work
looking using creative arts to communicate key health research messages
• The programme is experimental and offers the opportunity for the team to try
out different ideas and work with a range of artists.
• Successful creative ideas are developed and adapted to be used in our main
programmes such as the visual minutes and comic strip.
• Workshops are also offered to the wider R&D community on topics such as
animation, comic strip, film making and creative writing.
• Full details of workshops are available on our website
www.researchnorthwest.nhs.uk
(Please note this is an interactive workshop, flex your creative
thinking………………..)

5. ACADEMIC PROCESS OF COMMUNICATING RESEARCH
Not forgetting paper and poster presentations as well!!

6. ADVANTAGES
• Peer-reviewed journals are publications in which scientific
contributions have been vetted by experts in the relevant field.
• Peer-reviewed articles provide a trusted form of scientific
communication.
• Peer-reviewed work isn't necessarily correct or conclusive, but it does
meet the standards of science. (http://undsci.berkeley.edu/index.php)
• Poster and paper presentations can reach an audience that wont
necessarily read a paper a journal.

7. DISADVANTAGES
• Time to write up
• Time from submission to publication
• Restricted audiencel
• Lack of real evidence that peer review actually works: ‘Editorial peer review,
although widely used, is largely untested and its effects are uncertain (Journal
of the American Medical Association 2002)
(It is important to understand that it is saying that the evidence to support peer review has not yet been
produced, not that there is evidence that peer review does not work)

8. BEING CREATIVE CAN:-
• Help your research reach a wider audience
• Doesn’t need to use jargon or scary language
• Can be quicker than waiting for your paper to be published
• Can have a more powerful impact
• Can simplify the key message
• Is fun to do
• Can be done as a team or as an individual
• Can be tailored according to available resource

9. EXAMPLES…………..
• Creative writing, poems, songs and
music
• Pictures, photographs ,collages and
comic strips
• Plays ,films and podcasts other digital
media
• Animation, puppets, mime and dance
It can be:-
• Serious, sensible and informative
• Funny, slapstick, childlike
• Visual, auditory, tactile
• Hi tech, low tech,
• Clever,
silly………………………………….

10. CREATIVE COMMUNICATION…………………..

11. USING CREATIVE TECHNIQUES
• Identify key message
• Think about your audience
 Colleagues, patients, adults/children, medics, board members,
international, national, etc
• Identify resources
 Time, finance and expertise- build costs into bid
 Are you doing it or employing someone else?
• Consider process of dissemination
 E.g social media restrictions on NHS networks, YouTube, LinkedIn
 News letters, patient infomercial, posters, pictures,
• Be creative, take a risk and have fun!

12. EGS. APPS AND WEBSITES
Websites:-
• MakeBeliefsComix.com
• MarvelKids.com's Create Your Own Comic
• Pixton
• ToonDoon
Apps:-
• Comic Life
• Perfect Captions
• Episode
• Voice
• And many more…………….

13. NIHR NEW MEDIA COMPETITION SEPT/MARCH
• Communicate the clinical/applied health/social care research that you are
involved in
• Enthuse audiences about the research that you are involved in (the target
audience may be for example patients, researchers, colleagues, your friends and
family, children, the elderly, the general public)
• Get creative and use your media skills to get the NIHR message about research
out.
• Win prizes
You should be either:
• a member of the NIHR Faculty
• have recently completed your NIHR funded research.
• a patient/member of the public involved in NIHR research
http://www.nihr.ac.uk/our-faculty/new-media-competition.htm

14. CELIA KITZINGER (UNIVERSITY OF YORK) AND JENNY KITZINGER (CARDIFF UNIVERSITY) CO-
DIRECTORS OF THE COMA AND DISORDERS OF CONSCIOUSNESS RESEARCH CENTRE AND JOINT
WINNERS OF THE ESRC’S OUTSTANDING IMPACT IN SOCIETY AWARD, 2015
“running into the office last week carrying a bundle of eight foot bamboo poles,
along with a picnic blanket, an iron and a bag of sand, we reflected on the changing
role of the academic.
our unwieldy baggage was just part of what was needed for the shadow puppet play
that lunchtime – a collaboration with the play of light theatre company – translating
research on family experience of coma into a puppet performance for an audience
of medical students, care home workers, and lawyers”
we’ve been collaborating with a wide range of artists to ensure that our research findings are
accessible beyond academia. the performances, poetry, music, and art developed through such
collaborations bring the research findings into dialogue with creative artists – inviting
imaginative engagement and seeking to open out the debate about the vegetative or minimally
conscious state.
.

15. CELIA KITZINGER (UNIVERSITY OF YORK) AND JENNY KITZINGER (CARDIFF
UNIVERSITY) CO-DIRECTORS OF THE COMA AND DISORDERS OF CONSCIOUSNESS
RESEARCH CENTRE

16. GET INVOLVED
Not everyone is going to feel confident or skilled enough to perform
creatively in video but having a go and experimenting helps you to
identify what the possibilities are and in future to think more creatively
about how you disseminate your work.

17. QUICK CREATIVE CHALLENGE
• You have 15 minutes to work together in small groups of 3-5 and create
a poem, a collage, a sketch, a song or any other creative idea you may
have to communicate “why you do research” to the group.
• Keep it simple e.g., research saves lives, research is fun, research helps
people, saves money etc
• Be prepared to share it and /or perform it with the group at the end of the
session!!
• Jo will be filming it on her iPhone ( as she has completed our iphone
film making course!!)

18. WHAT NEXT…………………
Have a go…………..
• NHS R&D NW would be delighted to see what you do, Please send us
any photos, films songs poems etc. Don’t forget to enter the NIHR
media competition too!
• The NHS R&D NW Creative Workshop Programme is available on our
website.
• www.researchnorthewets.nhs.uk

19. Gillian Southgate
Assistant Director
NHS Research & Development North West
Contact:- Tues, Weds, Thurs, 9am-5pm ( Please note that I do not work Mon and Fri.)
Direct Dial Tel: 0161 935 8430
Mobile: 07825143562
Email: gillian.southgate@researchnorthwest.nhs.uk
Website: http://www.research.northwest.nhs.uk
Twitter: @NHSNWRD
Linkedin: NHS North West Research and Development
To know more about our programmes of work visit
http://www.youtube.com/user/NHSNorthRandD
A devolved regional NHS function hosted by Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust