In this blog series, we will be featuring our award winners and highly commended recipients from the Faculty’s ‘Outstanding Contribution to PPIE’ awards. The awards showcase inspirational and outstanding commitment to PPIE that has made a positive difference to our community and highlights the amazing events, activities, people and groups from across the Faculty.   

Our latest blog in this series features Dr Leah Quinlivan and her team, who were winners in the Group category at the 2025 PPIE Awards. Recognising the challenges of meaningful involvement in sensitive areas such as self-harm and suicide, the team co-designed an innovative toolkit to empower both researchers and public contributors, making PPIE safer, more accessible, and impactful. 

Left to right: Jav Rehman, another highly commended recipient; Dr Leah Quinlivan, project lead and research fellow at the NIHR GM PSRC; Dan Stears, public contributor and Non-Executive Lay Board Member of the NIHR GM PSRC at the 2025 PPIE Celebration Event.

Involving people with lived experience in self-harm and suicide research can feel daunting for researchers and healthcare professionals due to concerns about safeguarding and wellbeing. Dr Leah Quinlivan and colleagues at Centre for Mental Health and Safety and the NIHR Greater Manchester Patient Safety Research Collaboration (GM PSRC) set out to change this narrative. Through collaboration with the public and PPI groups, they developed practical resources to build confidence among researchers while ensuring safety and support for everyone involved. 

The team included public contributors from the Mutual Support for Mental Health-Research (MS4MH-R), a group of individuals with lived experience of self-harm, suicide or mental illness as patients or carers. With funding from NIHR GM PSRC, the team co-designed a suite of resources to provide guidance and advance PPIE in suicide prevention research. These include: 

• A shared learning toolkit to facilitate good practice in research work surrounding self-harm and suicide prevention 
• A guide for public contributors to navigate such research 
• An easy-to-read infographic for public contributors 
• Blogs, videos and a dedicated website showcasing the resources

Left to right: Elizabeth Monaghan, public contributor and member of the NIHR GM PSRC Public and Community Involvement and Engagement (PCIE) Advisory Group; Dr Leah Quinlivan; Dan Stears.

In summer 2024, additional funding from the Faculty’s Office for Social Responsibility enabled the team to host a webinar showcasing their toolkit and resources. It featured insightful talks from Dr Quinlivan, four MS4MH-R contributors, and included a session on creative approaches to involving young people in research. The event attracted significant interest and achieved impressive reach: 

• 149 people signed up to receive the co-designed resources 
• 119 participants attended the webinar 
• Recordings have been viewed nearly 2,000 times 
• Documents have been downloaded over 1,300 times 

The team’s resources are all available online and are used internationally by organisations such as the National Suicide Research Foundation, HSE Ireland, NHS Trusts, McPin Foundation, as well as universities across the UK, Ireland and Australia. 

Additional information: 

• GM PSRC | Toolkit: PPIE in self-harm and suicide prevention research 
• Launch of PPI Toolkits in Self-Harm and Suicide Prevention Research 
• Greater Manchester PSRC team recognised at Making a Difference Awards 2025 

To find out more about PPIE: watch our short film, sign up to the monthly Public Engagement Digest, visit the PPIE blog, or contact srbmh@manchester.ac.uk.       

To read more about other PPIE Award winners visit here. 

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