Co-designing strategies with community partners in an umbrella review

Abstract

Meaningful involvement of community members in evidence synthesis remains under-described. This study reflects on engaging two Community Co-Researchers with lived experience in the screening, data extraction validation, interpretation, and dissemination of an umbrella review. Their participation was supported through flexible engagement, task-specific training, and ongoing communication. The findings suggest that careful recruitment, clear roles, capacity-building, and collaborative processes are important for reducing tokenism and enabling lived experience to meaningfully inform evidence synthesis.