Supporting Equality of Access to research participation through translation and interpretation during informed consent: A Scoping Review

Ensuring equality of access to research participation for underserved groups is a key theme in the NIHR 2022-27 EDI strategy. However, this guidance recognises that additional work is required to ensure inclusive recruitment strategies are utilised to achieve this aim. For ethnically diverse populations, language is a significant barrier to participation in research, as it makes gaining informed consent difficult. Between 1% and 18% of regional UK populations cannot speak English, and a third of the UK population who cannot speak English are ‘not in good health’, meaning current recruitment approaches which exclude those who cannot speak English risk exclusion of an important proportion of the population. Addressing this barrier is an important step in supporting equality of access and ensuring our research is generalisable to the whole population we serve. In addressing this barrier we have devised a project which comprises of a scoping review to explore existing evidence in this area, a survey to review current practices, and qualitative interviews to gain greater insight from research delivery teams. The phases of the project will be synthesised with the aim of producing recommendations for practice for research delivery teams. The primary research question of the scoping review phase of the project is to establish what evidence currently existsto inform the use of translation and interpretation during informed consent for in research participation.