Aim

People have different experiences of eating, exercise, and body image, different experiences about seeking help and treatment, and different journeys through it all. livED is a place to share your journey, in the way you want to share it, to help us understand your experience, what has been helpful, what you think should be different, to help inform health systems and research. The livED study is the first of its kind in mental health research as the uniquely designed online platform allows an infinite number of people to share their experiences by contributing their stories however they choose to share them, as often as they want, and in as much detail as they want. In this study, we aim to trial the newly built web data collection platform called livED, to test the user experience, to connect with people in the community not usually involved in clinical research, and to consider novel and creative ways to capture health experiences.

Who runs the study

Researchers from the InsideOut Institute for Eating Disorders (a partnership between the University of Sydney and Sydney Local Health District).

Further Information

Please read the full Participant Information Statement.

If you have questions about this study, please e-mail Dr Jane Miskovic-Wheatley, Principal Investigator, PhD student and Research Stream Lead at InsideOut Institute via livedstudy@sydney.edu.au.

Who is eligible

Anyone who is 16 years or over who has a lived experience of disordered eating behaviours, body shape or weight concern, excessive exercise, eating disorders, or related experiences, past or present, is invited to share their story.

What is required

People can register to the platform and create a user profile. They will be asked a short, standardised survey once every 6 months, and then they can choose to share their experience via journal entries, voice recordings, responding to short prompts, drawings, however and whenever they choose, including past experiences and current situations.

They can also choose whether to consent to their experiences being linked to their health system data so researchers can gain more insights into health system usage, and/or whether people would like to find out about more research opportunities.

If at any time you feed distressed, call:

If you have questions about this study, please e-mail Dr Jane Miskovic-Wheatley, Principal Investigator, PhD student and Research Stream Lead at InsideOut Institute via livedstudy@sydney.edu.au.

This study is funded by the Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care National Health and Medical Research Council MRFF Million Minds Mission as part of the Mainstream: The Australian centre for health system research and translation in eating disorders project.

The ethical aspects of this study have been approved by the Human Research Ethics Committee (HREC) of The University of Sydney [Project No. 2023/895] in accordance with the National Statement on Ethical Conduct in Human Research (2023).

If you have any concerns about the study's procedures or would like to make a complaint to someone not involved in the study, please contact the University: Human Ethics Manager, human.ethics@sydney.edu.au, +61 2 8627 8176