Hello listeners and welcome to the Connecting Citizens to Science Podcast.

A podcast that explores methods and approaches that are used in research and science to connect communities and make

Welcome to the final episode of 2022.

I'm Dr.

Kim Ozano, and today we ask you to join us in celebrating a year of Connecting Citizens to Science podcasting.

I'm here with co-founder Beatrice Egid, and over the last year we have heard from communities and patients survivors,

In this celebratory episode to close out 2022, we have brought together previous co-hosts and guests to

To do this, we decided we would examine our learning along the translational research pathway.

The Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, who we've worked with in this last year, they have a translational research

LSTM works with a range of partners globally along this continuum, and today we will be hearing from some of

So welcome to our guests.

Let's start by hearing from Tosin.

I am Tosin Adekeye.

I work with the Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital in Zaria.

I work primarily in the mental health department.

I'm Akinola Oluwole.

I currently consult on with Sightsavers on the FGS project.

I was background in Zoology, but then now I'm a social scientist, social parasitologist, when the translation between, from

FGS is Female Genital Schistosomiasis, a condition that affects women and is quite stigmatising and can have

I am Yaimie, I was a master's student between 2020 and 2021 at the Tropical Disease Biology Masters, and now I'm leading a

I've been working in the UK for, for a bit now, processing my samples, but all the data has been collected in Guatemala and I've

We are bringing the, the research back to, to Guatemala and, I actually want to highlight the LSTM part in my life because there

So LSTM has been a big part for us at the university back in Guatemala because we know it's a great institution and

Thank you very much.

So I think what's really interesting here is we have different backgrounds and we're going to hear more about what that means

So I have worked at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine for five years as a social scientist and a

And I think you're right, Yaimie it's the networks is, is amazing.

Bea, have you, introduced yourself on any of our episodes?

I've been doing a PhD at LSTM for the last three years and before that I did a master's, the

My trajectory is an interesting one in that I started studying biology and I've moved much more towards kind of

It's been really interesting for me to kind of work across different departments at LSTM.

So I'm technically part of the vector biology department, but I work very closely with people in the International Public

So how should we explore this translational pathway?

Maybe we'll come to Yaimie first and ask her if we can get her take on what the translational pathway

I think of all of us here, Yaimie, someone's working very much at the initial stages of the

Yeah, sure.

Thank you.

So, translational research can be defined in several ways, depending on what are you working on.

Uh, but here focusing on, on the LSTM definition, I'm at the first stage on discovery.

My work has been focusing on, as I said, on cutaneous leishmaniasis in Guatemala, trying to discover and to understand which

As we all know, in a theoretical way, that it is a parasite, it involves a vector, it involves a vessel for a mammal, a

The specifics of this in Guatemala are unknown.

My work has been focusing the endemic community with the highest prevalence of cutaneous leishmaniasis in the country, trying to

We want to create these control tools despite having little information, now we want to start

So let's say, now I am analysing my data, and I have discovered some three species that we weren't confirmed that we had in Guatemala.

Now this gives me more information that I can go back to the community and say, we have this, what are we going to do?

We are not at the end of the pathway we're at just at the start, but we are going back to the community for feedback

At the first stage, with the information we have now, we're going to go to the community and say, "so

For me, it's a bit of a cycle., It's not linear.

It's a cycling stages and they all feed on it on each other, and you can go back and you discover

It has been very interesting to be working with the community, thinking about how we're going to implement, what are we going

I really like that and I think it's great that you brought back that this translational pathway that looks

Also, as you've highlighted, the importance of actually making sure that you're engaging with communities at every level of

I think that's really interesting.

Thanks Yaimie.

Yeah.

Akin.

I wonder if it might be good to hear a little bit from you here as a, I think you have this joke, you call yourself

I started with a background in Zoology.

Then at my postgrad level doing epidemiology, trying to, you know, have an interaction with the community to see, uh, the

You know, getting to see that people have this problem and we have to, you know, help solve it by bringing the attention of the government.

With the social science, approach, we get them to see or to understand from the perspective of the community what the Ministry of Health need

These are what we call the participatory action research cycle, where we try to understand what is the problem.

We get to the community to get their view about what we need to do to help them solve the problem.

Then we come back to the table with the Ministry of Health to see that this is what the people are saying they need.

It's not about doing the research from what we used to know, that we do research and just publish the paper, but then we

Yeah, I, I find this very interesting because I think that what you're talking about is stopping

What you're doing is collecting the data and asking the people what's going on and how you can implement this is, this is amazing and this

Of course we are going to try to, to not forget the side of science and publish, but as a community, what are we going to do?

How we can improve your lives?

And that's what you're doing.

This is amazing.

Yes.

I, I'm really excited about all of this because I come from a background before I started work with LSTM, over 22 years,

Tell them how they need to understand their lives.

Tell them, you know, how the therapy is going to work, but then having to work on the Countdown project,

Now we had to take that around to using the community-based participatory approach, which is now not the typical

If you don't do this, this is going to happen, to going back to now, listen, you know, to the people tell their story and tell it from

They are now providing that information and saying, if you have an intervention, this is how it's going to work in our community,

Finally coming also with my side of the science to say, okay, now I see it from your perspective.

This is the science behind it, and then shaping whatever intervention they want.

In fact, when we sat to talk about the interventions, you know, we had to sit back and say, "okay, how do you want it?".

"How is it going to work?".

We came with some suggestions and they would say to us, "that's not going to work here because

Now when we came to evaluation, we found out that it actually works, you know, so they are really the expert, and that's

We had this intervention between the urban centre and the rural community, and we did initially

Then from the study they had to tell us that this approach may not work because of 1, 2, 3.

Why?

Because of the status of the people, because of their belief system that they will not accept drugs from

We saw that when they brought up this by themselves, we tried to see how this will work.

It was interesting to see that in the next round of intervention when they used their own approach, which they suggested,

It's about how do we get the people involved to see how we want to translate what we are finding out to bring about the

You know, beyond the outputs and the difference, you know, something has just come to my mind when we were planning

Now, when we're discussing the method and looking at people affected by skin NTDs, who in our eyes, are not

You know, uh, the question I asked myself was how they would help us in developing themes, from the data that they had collected.

Now there's something significant there because as we sat down to say, "what does this photo tell?"

"what do you mean by this photo?"

" how does that describe your experience?", then we began to look at the themes that were emerging from

I saw them, literally tell us this collection of photographs, this is what they're talking about.

This collection of photographs, this is what they're talking about.

In other words, they were involved in the data processing and analysis, so it's not just the end point, it's also

I completely agree with you and coming from my side that I'm doing more quantitative research now.

What I'm doing is placing traps for insects and collecting samples from skin to, to identify the parasites, still,

Our traps were inside the house, near the house where they keep the animals and in the forest, this is a very rural area.

For me to place the traps, I know that I need a specific height, but they know where, so I've been

And they all excitedly come and, "yeah, you should put it here and we can store it, don't worry, do we need to do something?".

It's just like, no, that trap, just leave it alone.

It's going to work all night.

We're going to collect the insects.

Then, when we collect the insects trap the next day, because it's a trap for all night, we show them this is

The next day when we arrive again to collect the traps, they're like, "oh, you can see it there it is".

It's not it, but you can see that they remember what I told them because they are seeing, uh, very small insect.

There's some mixture of excitement when you find insect inside the house or when you don't

They're like, you should be happy because the then probably the transmission is not occurring in your house..

When we find the insects, they're very excited.

So yes, I, I agree completely that we need to involve communities

In my country, is a very diverse country.

We have 25 different ethnic groups.

Everything works different within each ethnic group.

I think all research should be translational research, not just staying on the bench, but, keeping all this together so the

I think it's great.

What's coming across so clear is the community, the people that we work with, they're our partners.

They're at the centre of what we do.

It sounds like over this last year we've, really embraced that, and I know at Health Systems Global, we heard a lot about gaining trust

So, on that note, Bea, do you have anything you would like to reflect on at this point?

And then I was thinking, let's get a learning that's happened from everyone over 2022.

I think one of my main reflections and learnings is just about genuine community engagement and

I think what's been really, um, inspiring about all these podcasts is the real genuine examples of real engagement with communities

I love hearing about how that's been applied to different, um, disciplines, in different contexts.

I think that's one of my main reflections and it's definitely inspired me in lots of ways that I will

Yeah, I think Akin mentioned policy makers and governance actors, they are also part of the community of making sure that

So, over the last year, if you think back to the work and your year and everything you've achieved, what's the main highlight in terms

Yaimie, should we start with you?

Sure.

I think that what I learned the most is to be adaptable because I had planned something to go to the field, but once I arrived

Could you come to my place?"

and everybody wanted the traps and I thought this could change a bit how I want to present my result, but the community wants this.

So I thought about it, how to improve it, we adapted in the field.

So yeah, my biggest learning is being adaptable and being open to change that not everything is as you wrote it in

Yeah.

It sounds also that the community have a right to say what they want from the research.

It affects them and uh, they should be able to voice that and we should be able to adapt to that in practice as well.

Tosin?

Yes, I think my main learning has to do with power balance.

As I listen to all the other podcasts, and hear from people from different disciplines and different countries and from different

That applies to power balance in that I'm not approaching it as, I'm the researcher, I'm the know-all, I have this

Wonderful.

Our listeners can't see here, but we've got lots of nodding and thumbs up in the group because

Akinola, what would you like to share with us from 2022?

Well, I think they've mentioned so many.

Just to add last is, lean not only on your own understanding and be open because you may not know that the person

Being open is crucial.

Bea, any last reflections on 2022 and your learning?

I think it's been really interesting for me doing this podcast.

Obviously talking to such a range of different people and seeing the parallels to the approach that I wanted take in

Hearing about how participatory action research is used for all kinds of different health issues and different contexts has really

It's also been great to hear from Yaimie who's also working in a kind of intersection of entomology

I'm just really grateful to have the opportunity to hear from so many other inspiring researchers

Thanks very much.

I think for me, just to end, I think the intersection between research and activism, Bea, as you were speaking then you

So thank you everyone for participating in our last celebratory podcast of 2022.

Listeners, we are not leaving you.

We will continue in 2023 and we are excited to start planning the episodes for next year.

So do like, share, rate, subscribe over the New Year and the festivities and all the best.

Thank you everyone.