Persons with lived experience (LE) are increasingly recognized by researchers and funding agencies (e.g., the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute) as valued and active members of research teams in ways that extend beyond research participation. Research with LE partners can be found in areas of patient-centered care, aging, homelessness, mental health, and other disciplines that attend to chronic illnesses and disease states. Broadly speaking, community-based research has been at the forefront of involving LE partners in research. For more than 45 years, extensive community-based participatory research has incorporated persons and communities with LE into research and has informed community-engaged researchers across numerous scholarly disciplines
LE is invaluable to research endeavors as persons most impacted by a social or medical condition are recognized as most knowledgeable of the impact conditions and interventions have on their lives. Persons with LE are advocates for being at the table when research and knowledge is generated that will directly impact their lives. LE partners have been included in research as co-researchers, peer researchers, or advisory board members. Building from these prior examples of collaboration with persons with LE in research, this paper offers an example from one LE group who co-conceptualized a 1-year knowledge mobilization (KMb) project, supported the project’s funding application, and played an integral role in the project’s development and implementation. Key steps and actions taken by the LE team [End Page 523] during this process are described, followed by lessons learned from this project that will strengthen future KMb efforts. Lessons presented here can also inform other community-based research partnerships with LE advisors.
