Consumer and Community Involvement

WAHTN is committed to advancing consumer involvement across health and research sectors. The value of involving consumers in health and medical research cannot be underestimated. Consumer Involvement brings a unique perspective to all areas of research including planning, policy, funding, evaluation and reporting, as well as participation in the research project. Extensive research in Australia and internationally provides compelling evidence that the involvement of consumers in health and medical research achieves many benefits.
Consumer Involvement:

  • increases the relevance and responsiveness of research to health needs
  • improves the quality of research and its impact on health outcomes
  • strengthens the effective translation of research into policy and practice
  • builds public confidence in health and medical research
  • increases opportunities for research funding

WAHTN believes that, as primary stakeholders, consumers have an inherent right to be involved in health and medical research and should be encouraged, supported and given opportunities to do so.

WAHTN’s work on CCI is focused in the following areas:

We are collaborating nationally through the Australian Health Research Alliance (AHRA) CCI Initiative.