Strengthening mental health research outcomes through genuine partnerships with young people with lived or living experience: A pilot evaluation study.

BACKGROUND: Despite increasing support for stakeholder inclusion in research, there is limited evaluative research to guide safe (i.e., youth-friendly) and meaningful (i.e., non-tokenistic) partnerships with young people with lived experience of mental ill-health in research. This paper describes a pilot evaluation and iterative design of a Youth Lived Experience Working Group (LEWG) protocol that was established by the Youth Mental Health and Technology team at The University of Sydney's Brain and Mind Centre, based on the results of two studies. METHODS: Study one consisted of a pilot evaluation of the extent to which youth partners felt empowered to contribute, to qualitatively explore how LEWG processes could be improved. Youth partners completed online surveys, and results were shared over two LEWG meetings in 2021 to empower youth partners to collectively identify actions of positive change regarding LEWG processes. These meetings were audio-recorded and transcripts were subsequently coded using thematic analysis. Study two assessed whether LEWG processes and proposed improvements were acceptable and feasible from the perspective of academic researchers via an online survey in 2022. RESULTS: Quantitative and qualitative data collected from nine youth partners and 42 academic researchers uncovered initial learnings regarding facilitators, motivators, and barriers to partnering with young people with lived experience in research. Implementing clear processes for youth partners and academic researchers on effective partnership strategies, providing training opportunities for youth partners to develop research skills, and providing regular updates on how youth partner contributions led to research outcomes were identified as key facilitators. CONCLUSIONS: This pilot study provides insight into a growing international field on how to optimise participatory processes so that researchers and young people with lived experience can be better supported and engaged to make meaningful contributions to mental health research. We argue that more transparency is needed around participatory research processes so that partnerships with young people with lived experience are not merely tokenistic. CONSUMER CONTRIBUTIONS: Our study has also been approved by and reflects the concepts and priorities of our youth lived experience partners and lived experience researchers, all of whom are authors of this paper.

Effect of drawing a discard tube on PT and APTT results in healthy adults.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to compare results obtained for the prothrombin time (PT) and the activated partial thromboplastin time (APTT) using specimens drawn with and without a discard tube in healthy adults. DESIGN: A specimen of blood in a 3.2% sodium citrate, 5.0 mL tube was drawn from one arm with a discard tube and from the other arm without a discard tube on 35 healthy adults. A PT and APTT were performed on each specimen using a fibrometer. SETTING: The PT and APTT tests were all performed in the student laboratory of the Clinical Laboratory Science Program at East Carolina University. PATIENTS OR OTHER PARTICIPANTS: Study subjects induded technician, technologist, and phlebotomist employees of the clinical laboratory at Pitt County Memorial Hospital, and faculty and junior and senior students in the Clinical Laboratory Science Program at East Carolina University, Greenville, North Carolina. All participants signed an informed consent prior to venipuncture. INTERVENTIONS: Two coagulation specimens were drawn from each subject. Specimens in a discard (no anticoagulant) tube and then an anticoagulated tube were drawn from one arm, and a specimen in a single anticoagulant tube was drawn from the other arm. The PT and APTT were performed using standardized procedures with Pacific Hemostasis reagents and controls and a BBL FibroSystem fibrometer. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: The degree of difference between PT results and between APTT results for specimens drawn with and without a discard tube. RESULTS: Based on paired t-test analyses, no difference in mean PT results and no difference in mean APTT results were found between specimens drawn with a discard tube and those drawn without a discard tube at an alpha of 0.05. Paired-samples correlation coefficients were significant for both the PT and the APTT at an alpha of 0.05, showing precision between results with and without a discard tube for both coagulation tests. CONCLUSIONS: Relative to sampling from a population of healthy adults, drawing a discard tube before a sodium citrate tube for coagulation testing appears to make an insignificant difference. Replication of these results with patients receiving anticoagulant therapy and/or patients with abnormal coagulation results, would offer cost savings by justifying elimination of discard tubes for blood draws for coagulation testing only. Such a change in protocol would also reduce the likelihood of nosocomial blood loss in vulnerable patient populations.