Partnerships are a core element of Global Health research. LSHTM is committed to building equitable research partnerships that facilitate understanding, fairness, awareness of each other’s contexts, trust and mutual exchange of expertise and knowledge. Building on existing guidelines, we have developed the EquiPar Tool to Support Equitable Partnerships for Research Projects, to help LSHTM and our partners establish strong foundations and processes for our research partnerships. We intend that research teams will use EquiPar in their current and developing research projects to help them think through their partnerships systematically, prompting action and change where necessary to promote effective and equitable collaboration.

EquiPar is being piloted for six months by a sample of five to eight research projects involving collaboration between LSHTM and LMIC partners, and an evaluation of this pilot will be conducted. The evaluation aims to assess the perceptions and experiences of LSHTM staff and our partners in using EquiPar, and to identify options for improvement. An online workshop was held at the start of the pilot to introduce EquiPar and obtain initial feedback. At the end of the 6 month pilot the evaluation team will conduct an online survey of all project staff who have engaged with the tool; in-depth interviews with a sub-set of staff from each project; and a closing workshop to present and discuss preliminary findings. Outputs will include a revised version of the Tool (assuming it is found to be useful), a report of the findings of the pilot evaluation, potentially a paper for publication, and communications resources to promote the tool.

Further details of the pilot and the participating projects are available in the Evaluation of the EquiPar Pilot introductory presentation.