
Patient & Public
Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement
Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement (PPIE) informs the identification, prioritisation, design, and execution of research.
Our Lay Board members sit within our team and support research by providing input to grant applications, informing the development of studies at various stages, reviewing study protocols, and disseminating research results.
We are following the UK Standards for Public Involvement and enhancing our existing PPIE strategies to align with key growth areas of technologies.
Lay Board Members
We have a team of five experienced and enthsiastic lay board members.

Dr Alison Allam
Alison has experiences in working with several different organisations, including NICE in the role of standing member for their quality standards advisory and NIHR both as a member of PIVIN and more recently as a member of the Health Services and Delivery Research (HS&DR) Programme. She also involved with Cancer Research UK and specifically with precision medicine and how recent developments in this emerging area of research are communicated to the wider public. She has joined the London IVD Co-op as a lay advisory panel as she was particularly interested in how patient involvement can be promoted at such an early stage of diagnostics and the patient pathway.

Diane Eaton
Diane has gained PPI experience through her involvement with Herts Valley CCG, Anticoagulation in Practice, ABPI and Anticoagulation UK (ACE UK). Across these settings, she is responsible for representing patients, reviewing and evaluating GP services and developing educational information and resources. She has facilitated focus groups seeking patient input for the development of technologies for the diagnosis of VTE and anticoagulation management. In the capacity of patient expert and on behalf of ACEUK, she is responsible for making submissions to NICE for Technology and Diagnostic guidance. She has joined the London IVD Co-op as she has an interest in diagnostics and wish to expand her knowledge and understanding of research and integration of new technologies into the NHS pathways.

Dr Rebecca Harmston
Becky is a disabled autistic adult living with long-term health conditions. She is also a carer for an autistic child. Her background is in cancer imaging. She is interested in health research and the development of tests and interventions which improve diagnosis rates, allow non-invasive monitoring and reduce patient burden. She currently works as a patient representative with NICE, the NIHR, charities and patient groups to make sure that the voices of patients are heard in research. She has experience in ethics, technology appraisal, diagnostics, data access, grant application reviewing and writing plain English documents for patients.

Maurice Hoffman
Maurice joined the London IVD Co-op because he believes that through his knowledge of the research process together with an understanding of the commercial world, he can provide valuable input into the development of diagnostic devices. He is a lay member of NRES Brent Research Ethics Committee; review grant applications for the National Institute of Health Research and provide input as a patient member of Imperial Biomedical Research Centre. He is also an independent member of the Statinwise Trial Steering Committee. Within the NHS, he is a lay member of the Advisory Committee for Clinical Excellence Awards, London North West; patient representative on the NHS Digital E-Referrals Advisory Board and lay partner of Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust.

Deb Smith
Deb has been involved with CLARCH, Coventry and Warwickshire partnership trust, Alzheimer’s society, Oxford trauma research, and Healthwatch Warwickshire as a lay advisor and a committee to review and comment on research and funding applications, and support development of PPI work. She joined the London IVD Co-op because of her passion for research and a desire to use her experience to help and to widen her knowledge and experience.
PPI Documents and Resources
To find out more about NIHR London IVD Co-operative’s Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement work you can download our strategy below.