PLAIN ENGLISH SUMMARY There is a consensus that patients and the public should be involved in research in a meaningful way. However, to date, lay people have been mostly involved in developing research ideas and commenting on patient information.We previously published a paper describing our experience with lay partners conducting observations in a study of how patients in hospital are involved with their medicines. In a later part of the same study, lay partners were also involved in analysing interviews that a researcher had conducted with patients, carers and healthcare professionals about patient and carer involvement with medicines in hospital. We therefore wanted to build on our previous paper and report on our experiences with lay partners helping to conduct data analysis. We therefore interviewed the lay members and researchers involved in the analysis to find out their views.Both lay members and researchers reported that lay partners added value to the study by bringing their own perspectives and identifying further areas for the researcher to look for in the interviews. In this way researchers and lay partners were able to work together to produce a richer analysis than would have been possible from either alone. ABSTRACT Background It is recognised that involving lay people in research in a meaningful rather than tokenistic way is both important and challenging. In this paper, we contribute to this debate by describing our experiences of lay involvement in data analysis.Methods We conducted semi-structured interviews with the lay partners and researchers involved in qualitative data analysis in a wider study of inpatient involvement in medication safety. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and coded using open thematic analysis.Results We interviewed three lay partners and the three researchers involved. These interviews demonstrated that the lay members added value to the analysis by bringing their own perspectives; these were systematically integrated into the analysis by the lead researcher to create a synergistic output. Some challenges arose, including difficulties in recruiting a diverse range of members of the public to carry out the role; however there were generally fewer challenges in data analysis than there had been with our previous experience of lay partners' involvement in data collection.Conclusions Lay members can add value to health services research by being involved in qualitative data analysis.

中文翻译：

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参与卫生服务研究中的定性数据分析：一项描述性研究。

简明英语摘要 患者和公众应以有意义的方式参与研究，这一点已达成共识。然而，迄今为止，非专业人士主要参与了研究思路的发展和对患者信息的评论。我们之前发表了一篇论文，描述了我们与非专业合作伙伴在一项关于医院患者如何参与其药物的研究中进行观察的经验。在同一研究的后半部分，外行合作伙伴还参与分析了研究人员与患者、护理人员和医疗保健专业人员就患者和护理人员在医院用药的情况进行的访谈。因此，我们希望以我们之前的论文为基础，报告我们与非专业合作伙伴帮助进行数据分析的经验。因此，我们采访了参与分析的外行成员和研究人员，以了解他们的观点。外行成员和研究人员都报告说，外行合作伙伴通过带来自己的观点并确定研究人员在采访中寻找的更多领域，为研究增加了价值. 通过这种方式，研究人员和非专业合作伙伴能够共同努力，产生比单独进行更丰富的分析。抽象背景 人们认识到，以有意义的而非象征性的方式让非专业人士参与研究既重要又具有挑战性。在本文中，我们通过描述我们非专业人士参与数据分析的经验来为这场辩论做出贡献。方法 我们对参与定性数据分析的非专业合作伙伴和研究人员进行了半结构化访谈，以对住院患者参与药物安全进行更广泛的研究。采访被逐字转录并使用开放主题分析进行编码。结果我们采访了三位非专业合作伙伴和三位研究人员。这些访谈表明，非专业成员通过提出自己的观点为分析增加了价值；首席研究员将这些系统地整合到分析中，以产生协同效应。出现了一些挑战，包括难以招募各类公众来履行职责；然而，与我们之前的非专业合作伙伴参与数据收集的经验相比，数据分析面临的挑战通常较少。