PLAIN ENGLISH SUMMARY Many funding bodies within the United Kingdom and globally have encouraged public involvement in research. The Department of Health has also called public involvement a sign of good research. Despite the wide acceptance of public involvement improving many aspects of research, from its design to its communication, involvement has varied levels of implementation across different fields of research. Sports people have rarely been involved in research, partly as this research tends not to be funded by mainstream funding bodies. This may lead to a lower research quality, not founded in player ('service user') experiences. When creating a study of former rugby player health, we were very keen to involve rugby players, understand their thoughts on player health, and their playing experiences. This article explains how rugby players were involved in several ways, but mainly in group discussions during the design stage. These groups helped to inform our study's aims and questionnaire, ensure the questionnaire would capture player experiences and answer questions relevant to players, that they would like to understand after their participation in rugby. We found that these groups were easy to arrange, and that in only one session with each group, we were given many ideas of how to improve the questionnaire and study. We believe that other studies in sports should involve sports people, and that this is a useful activity that will change data collection forms and processes, improving the research, helping researchers, and making studies more suitable for players who take part in them. ABSTRACT Background Patient and public involvement ('involvement') in the UK has increased in accordance with funding requirements, patient-centered health policy initiatives and reporting of the positive impact of involvement for those involved, research and researchers. However, involvement has not been implemented equally across all disease areas and populations. The aim of this process was to involve rugby players across the research cycle of a player health study, ensure the study is player-centred, and that players had approved and informed the design of the study and its questionnaire from their playing experiences. Methods Two group discussions were undertaken with current students who were playing rugby at a Collegiate University. All male and female University rugby players and two College rugby teams were approached to become involved. Sessions were chaired by a player-lead using a topic guide and were audio-recorded and transcribed. Player suggestions were extracted by the player-lead and discussed within the study team for inclusion in the player health study and its questionnaire. Results Players readily engaged with the sessions and made many contributions to the development of the study and the questionnaire. Players discussed whether certain topics were being collected satisfactorily, and whether the questionnaire would encompass their playing experiences or that of other players. Players suggested where answers might be less reliable, and ways in which this could be improved. Players recommended additions to the questionnaire, and questioned researchers on the choice of language, motivation for question inclusion and if measures were standardised or novel. Alterations were made to the questionnaire based on suggestions, where these were agreed by the study team. Conclusions Involving a group of players in the design of a player health study and questionnaire was not an arduous process and was rewarding for researchers. The process resulted in numerous alterations to the questionnaire and its functionality, which may improve response rate, the experience of players participating in the player health study, and their ability to report relevant information aligned with their previous experience. Player involvement in research was feasible to implement and improved not only the questionnaire, but also researcher confidence in the project and player experiences being accurately captured and leading a reliable data collection processes in a population with the potential for cultural bias to affect the ascertainment of health, pain and injury.

中文翻译：

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橄榄球运动员在共同开展运动员健康研究时的咨询：体育参与者作为研究伙伴的可行性和后果。


简单英语摘要 英国和全球范围内的许多资助机构都鼓励公众参与研究。卫生部还称公众参与是良好研究的标志。尽管公众参与被广泛接受，可以改善研究的许多方面，从设计到沟通，但不同研究领域的参与程度不同。运动员很少参与研究，部分原因是这项研究往往不受主流资助机构的资助。这可能会导致研究质量降低，而不是建立在玩家（“服务用户”）体验之上。在对前橄榄球运动员健康状况进行研究时，我们非常热衷于让橄榄球运动员参与其中，了解他们对球员健康的想法以及他们的比赛经历。本文解释了橄榄球运动员如何以多种方式参与，但主要是在设计阶段进行小组讨论。这些小组帮助告知我们的研究目标和调查问卷，确保调查问卷能够捕捉球员的经历并回答与球员相关的问题，这些问题是他们在参加橄榄球比赛后希望了解的。我们发现这些小组很容易安排，而且在每个小组的一次会议中，我们就得到了许多关于如何改进问卷和研究的想法。我们认为，体育方面的其他研究应该让运动员参与进来，这是一项有用的活动，将改变数据收集的形式和过程，改进研究，帮助研究人员，并使研究更适合参与其中的运动员。 摘要 背景 随着资金需求、以患者为中心的卫生政策举措以及参与对参与者、研究和研究人员的积极影响的报告，英国患者和公众的参与（“参与”）有所增加。然而，参与并未在所有疾病领域和人群中得到平等实施。此过程的目的是让橄榄球运动员参与运动员健康研究的整个研究周期，确保研究以运动员为中心，并且运动员已批准并根据其比赛经历告知研究设计及其调查问卷。方法 与在大学打橄榄球的在校学生进行了两组小组讨论。所有男女大学橄榄球运动员和两支大学橄榄球队都被邀请参与其中。会议由一名玩家主持，使用主题指南进行主持，并进行录音和转录。玩家的建议由玩家领导提取并在研究团队内进行讨论，以纳入玩家健康研究及其调查问卷中。结果 参与者很乐意参与会议，并对研究和调查问卷的发展做出了许多贡献。玩家讨论了某些主题的收集是否令人满意，以及调查问卷是否涵盖他们或其他玩家的游戏经历。玩家提出了答案可能不太可靠的地方以及可以改进的方法。玩家建议对调查问卷进行补充，并向研究人员询问语言的选择、问题纳入的动机以及衡量标准是否标准化或新颖。 根据建议对调查问卷进行了修改，并得到了研究小组的同意。结论 让一组玩家参与玩家健康研究和调查问卷的设计并不是一个艰巨的过程，而且对研究人员来说是有益的。该过程导致了对调查问卷及其功能的大量修改，这可能会提高响应率、参与玩家健康研究的玩家的体验，以及他们报告与之前的体验一致的相关信息的能力。玩家参与研究是可行的，不仅可以实施和改进调查问卷，还可以提高研究人员对项目的信心，准确捕捉玩家体验，并在可能存在文化偏见影响健康确定的人群中引导可靠的数据收集过程、疼痛和伤害。