On 18 October, the British Library, research organisation UKOLN and the Association of Medical Research Charities will launch the findings of the Patients Participate! project, in an event entitled Health in the Headlines: Making Sense of the Science?

The event – which is part of the British Library’s TalkScience series – will be chaired by Tracey Brown, director of the charitable trust Sense about Science.

Patients Participate! asked patients, the public, medical research charities and the research community ‘How can we work together in making sense of scientific literature, to truly open up research findings for everyone who is interested?’

The study showed that patients want easy-to-understand, evidence-based information relating to biomedical and health research. Based on the findings, the project recommends publishing a lay summary alongside every research article.

Said Lee-Ann Coleman, head of science, technology and medicine at the British Library, “The British Library supports access for everyone who wants to do research, but providing access to information, through services like UK PubMed Central, is only the first part of the story.

"There is so much scientific literature – and it’s so complicated; developing ways to help people make sense of it has to go hand-in-hand with access.”

Engaging with the wider community is increasingly important for researchers. Some universities now offer researchers training in communicating with lay audiences. Providing this training more widely would be valuable.

Dr Liz Lyon, director of UKOLN, University of Bath, explains, "The Patients Participate! project has demonstrated the potential value of lay summaries to make research more accessible to a wider audience.

"There is certainly an appetite for this information, and we see the new How-to Guide for researchers as a positive step in helping academics and researchers to communicate their findings and to bridge the understanding gap."