News

Co-designing research with people with Parkinson’s

Featured on Parkinson's UK website

Dr Emmanuel Tsekleves (ImaginationLancaster) is featured on Parkinson’s UK website in an article called ‘Exploring playfulness in Parkinson’s’, looking at part of his research scoping work.

Emmanuel involved people in exploring the potential value for playfulness in increasing motivation, perceived control and well-being for people with Parkinson’s.

All the connections and exploratory conversations have reshaped not just our research, but have also transformed our personal life and the vision of our future practice.

Why? When Emmanuel started thinking about a potential research project in this area he only had a general idea from the existing literature but had no or little applied understanding.

Emmanuel wanted to have the research questions set by people affected by Parkinson’s, recognising their knowledge and experience on what works and doesn’t.

He wanted to offer people the opportunity to voice their needs, views and aspirations and drive the formation of a research project rather than simply participating in the research.

How? Emmanuel involved 4 local Parkinson’s UK Groups and a total of 75 people and workshops with each group. These workshops employed very creative, visual and playful tools to empower people affected by Parkinson’s to express their lived experiences, set research priorities, develop new ideas and provide feedback.

The workshops and feedback lead to the development of the research question for their  proposal. It enabled the research team to get an actual understanding of the needs and priorities of people affected by Parkinson’s to direct the research.