The role of power in co‐approaches to health research: insights from Spain and the United Kingdom with a rapid review of reviews

Introduction

Co-approaches to health research with socially excluded groups are becoming increasingly popular in the discourse of funding schemes in Spain and the United Kingdom. Such approaches aim to challenge the traditional research paradigm between researcher–participants by sharing power in knowledge production within the parameters of academic culture. This article collates the experience of six researchers working in ongoing funded health-related research projects that use co-approaches alongside racialized communities, people with learning disabilities, populations involved in the criminal justice system and people experiencing deep poverty.

Methods

Drawing from the authors' collective experiences and operational questions about power, a rapid review of reviews was implemented. This review included a search within five databases from April to May 2024. Findings were analysed from the Emancipatory Power Framework (Popay et al., Health Promotion International 36, no. 5 (2021): 1253–1263) to identify, evaluate and discover insight into power dynamics that should be understood to have meaningful impact in co-approaches to health research, funding and evaluation of these initiatives.

Results

38 articles were included in the review. A total of eight categories emerged in the analysis linked to ‘power within’, ‘power with’, ‘power to’ and ‘power over’.

Conclusion

These findings contribute to deepening the critical discussion of co-approaches, peeling back the layers of power that define academic culture, and aligning current and future health equity research with valuation of care, Open Science and new dimensions of power such as digitalization.

Patient or Public Contribution Statement

This rapid review of reviews is informed by the authors' experience in co-produced research. While patients and the public were not directly involved in conducting this review, the selection and synthesis of the literature were guided by insights from prior collaborative research with diverse communities.