Health research topics have traditionally been chosen by researchers or scientists and may not always reflect the needs of people living with a particular condition.  People living with VTE, their loved ones and their health care team are experts in living with blood clots and have questions of their own that need to be heard.

We are a team of doctors, nurses, researchers and patients who are interested in hearing your questions about VTE. Your valuable input will help us develop better research questions that are based on real experiences with diagnosis, treatment, and care.

Our process is adapted from the James Lind Alliance, an organization in the United Kingdom that brings together patients, caregivers and clinicians to identify and prioritize the Top 10 unanswered research.

It begins with gathering questions, through surveys of patients, clinicians and caregivers for their top questions related to VTE. We then merge and categorize these questions into common themes and check them against existing research evidence to see if these questions are already answered. The shortlisted questions are then reviewed and finalized by a group of patients and clinicians from across Canada. Their final shortlist is then brought to an in person workshop where patients, clinicians, and caregivers review and rank the proposed questions into a top 10 prioritized list. The top 10 prioritized list is then shared publicly and used to guide future patient oriented research.

More information about the James Lind Alliance can be found here.