For patients and the public

Mission statement

At the INCISE project, we are dedicated to revolutionising bowel cancer screening by creating predictive tools for bowel cancer surveillance. Our mission is to actively involve patients and the public in every stage of our research to ensure it is deeply rooted in real-world experiences and addresses genuine patient needs.

We believe that the insights of people who live with bowel cancer are invaluable. Through our Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement (PPIE) approach, we engage with people to shape the design, conduct, and dissemination of our research. By collaborating closely with patients, clinicians, and industry partners, we aim to improve screening guidelines and develop tools that can more accurately predict who will develop another polyp in the future. We hope this will prevent bowel cancer and improve patient outcomes.

Our commitment is to work with the public, not just for them, ensuring that our research is transparent, inclusive, and responsive to the needs of the community we serve. Through regular PPIE group meetings and ongoing engagement, we aim to make a meaningful impact on bowel cancer prevention.

About our research

Bowel cancer screening is used to find cancer and pre-cancerous growths, called polyps, in people who do not have symptoms. The aim is to catch bowel cancer early and stop it by removing polyps before they turn into cancer. There are guidelines to help clinicians decide who needs a follow-up colonoscopy and when they need it. These guidelines are based on the size and number of polyps, but they are not very accurate. Many people who have one or a few small polyps removed during their first colonoscopy are not scheduled for follow-up, even though they might develop future polyps or cancer later. We need better guidelines to meet the needs of individual patients.

The INCISE project - INtegrated TeChnologies for Improved Polyp SurveillancE – is a University of Glasgow-led team of researchers, clinicians and industry partners. Our aim is to transform bowel cancer screening in the UK by creating a tool that can predict which patients with polyps will get further polyps.

Patient and Public Involvement (PPI)

The INCISE project strongly advocates for Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) in research. PPI in research means research that is done with the public, not for them. It means that bowel cancer patients or their family members can help with how research is designed and carried out.

We regularly engage with people who live with bowel cancer to make sure that our research is relevant to real-world experiences and patient needs.

Our Glasgow Colorectal PPIE steering group meets three times per year. If you, or a loved one, lives with bowel cancer and you would like to join our group, please get in touch with Emma Parsons (Emma.Parsons@glasgow.ac.uk).

Public Engagement (PE)

We held our first public engagement activity "Polyp Patrol" as part of Explorathon 2024. Since then, we have:

You can stay up to date on our upcoming public engagement activities by following us on X (@LabEdwards) or Bluesky (@labedwards.bsky.social‬).