{"id":1815,"date":"2026-09-01T12:16:19","date_gmt":"2026-09-01T12:16:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/per\/?p=1815"},"modified":"2026-09-01T12:16:22","modified_gmt":"2026-09-01T12:16:22","slug":"listening-to-mothers-how-patient-and-public-involvement-shaped-the-pincs-study","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/per\/2026\/09\/01\/listening-to-mothers-how-patient-and-public-involvement-shaped-the-pincs-study\/","title":{"rendered":"Listening to Mothers: How Patient and Public Involvement Shaped the PINCS Study\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Professor Emma Pitchforth, Dr Joanne Morrison, and Victoria Cullimore explain the process behind Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement (PPIE) on their recent study, Postnatal Intervention for Cervical Screening. This work was supported by our 2025-6 Engaged and Participatory Research Fund, to help the research team gain lived experience perspectives ahead of the next phase of the project.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Amount of award &#8211; \u00a35125<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The PINCS (Postnatal Intervention for Cervical Screening) study is focused on improving cervical screening options for&nbsp;people&nbsp;after having a baby. Cervical cancer is most common in women&nbsp;and people with a cervix&nbsp;aged 30\u201335, which overlaps with the average age of childbirth. Despite this, many&nbsp;people&nbsp;find it difficult to attend cervical screening appointments during the postnatal period. Our research, conducted between Somerset Foundation&nbsp;Trust, the University of Exeter, Royal Cornwall and Royal Devon University&nbsp;Hospitals,&nbsp;&nbsp;explores&nbsp;whether screening could be made easier and more accessible for new&nbsp;parents, for example by offering screening alongside the routine 6-week postnatal check or through self-sampling options. The aim is to&nbsp;identify&nbsp;practical ways to improve screening uptake and reduce cervical cancer risk, and from itsoutset, patient and public involvement and engagement (PPIE) was a central part of the project.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Engaged and Participatory Research&nbsp;funding enabled us to work directly with&nbsp;parents&nbsp;of young babies to understand their experiences&nbsp;through&nbsp;a series of&nbsp;discussion groups. The first took place at a mother and baby group in rural Devon, giving us the opportunity to speak with women face-to-face&nbsp;about their views on cervical screening after birth.&nbsp;We then held four online discussion groups, advertised through maternity social media networks to reach a wider range of&nbsp;people. More than 100&nbsp;people&nbsp;volunteered to take part,&nbsp;demonstrating&nbsp;that there is a&nbsp;strong&nbsp;public&nbsp;interest in research focused on postnatal health. These discussions explored barriers to attending cervical screening appointments, as well as&nbsp;participating in&nbsp;related&nbsp;research.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We also sought feedback on our study plans, participant\u00a0information\u00a0and recruitment approach, which\u00a0had a direct impact on the design of the PINCS study.\u00a0Parents\u00a0provided practical suggestions that helped make the research more accessible and relevant.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">As a result of their feedback, we:&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>revised study documentation to make it clearer and easier to understand&nbsp;<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>developed an information and recruitment video<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>highlighted support available to participants, including free parking and reimbursement<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>refined our recruitment strategy to better reflect the realities of caring for a 6 or 12-week-old baby.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The PPIE work strengthened the study aims, improved&nbsp;feasibility&nbsp;and helped ensure participation was realistic for new&nbsp;parents. Many&nbsp;people&nbsp;valued the opportunity to contribute to&nbsp;this type of research, highlighting the importance of involving&nbsp;people&nbsp;with lived experience of&nbsp;childbirth&nbsp;and cervical screening&nbsp;as&nbsp;research&nbsp;partners.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Considering that the focus of our research was on developing more accessible screening\u00a0options\u00a0for\u00a0people\u00a0in the postnatal period, one\u00a0of\u00a0our\u00a0biggest challenges was designing involvement activities that were accessible\u00a0to this target audience.\u00a0Online discussion groups proved particularly valuable, enabling\u00a0people\u00a0from\u00a0different locations\u00a0to\u00a0participate\u00a0around caring responsibilities and helping us reach a broader range of perspectives.\u00a0It was clear to us\u00a0that early involvement leads to better research. By engaging\u00a0parents\u00a0before recruitment began, we\u00a0identified\u00a0barriers that might otherwise have reduced\u00a0research\u00a0participation. Their feedback challenged our assumptions and helped us focus on what would genuinely make the study easier to access.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This&nbsp;PPIE work has positioned us strongly for the next phase of the project. We have now begun recruiting&nbsp;for a second study&nbsp;with a target of 100 participants. Looking ahead, we&nbsp;have used&nbsp;the&nbsp;findings from&nbsp;both studies&nbsp;to co-design a larger&nbsp;trials&nbsp;with&nbsp;new parents&nbsp;and other stakeholders.&nbsp;Through this work we have also&nbsp;identified&nbsp;people with lived experience&nbsp;willing to get involved in co-production of&nbsp;research&nbsp;in this and other&nbsp;projects&nbsp;related to&nbsp;gynaecological&nbsp;reproductive health.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ultimately, we\u00a0hope this programme of research will generate the evidence needed to influence cervical screening policy and improve access to screening for postnatal\u00a0people. The enthusiasm shown by\u00a0new parents\u00a0throughout the project has reinforced the value of working in partnership\u00a0&#8211; their\u00a0experiences have\u00a0hugely\u00a0strengthened the research and will continue to shape future studies.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Photography credit &#8211; James Ram<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Professor Emma Pitchforth, Dr Joanne Morrison, and Victoria Cullimore explain the process behind Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement (PPIE) on their recent study, Postnatal Intervention for Cervical Screening. This work was supported by our 2025-6 Engaged and Participatory Research Fund, to help the research team gain lived experience perspectives ahead of the next phase of the project.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2305,"featured_media":1819,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[11,33,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1815","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-case-study","category-engaged-and-participatory-research-fund","category-funding"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Listening to Mothers: How Patient and Public Involvement Shaped the PINCS Study\u00a0 - Public Engagement with Research (PER) at the University of Exeter<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sites.exeter.ac.uk\/per\/2026\/09\/01\/listening-to-mothers-how-patient-and-public-involvement-shaped-the-pincs-study\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Listening to Mothers: How Patient and Public Involvement Shaped the PINCS Study\u00a0 - Public Engagement with Research (PER) at the University of Exeter\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Professor Emma Pitchforth, Dr Joanne Morrison, and Victoria Cullimore explain the process behind Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement (PPIE) on their recent study, Postnatal Intervention for Cervical Screening. 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