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Dr Lavinia Bertini

Senior Research Fellow
E: l.bertini@bsms.ac.uk
Location: Room 107, Watson Building, University of Brighton, Falmer, BN1 9PH

Areas of expertise: Critical Public Health; Applied Health Research; Medical Anthropology

Methods: Ethnographic Research Methods; Co-production; Discourse analysis; Stakeholder Engagement; Mixed methods.

Research interests: Health inequities; Infection control in adult social care settings; Food-related interventions in public health and social care; Fatphobia and weight-stigma in public health and healthcare.

Twitter handle: @laviniaresearch

Biography

Dr Lavinia Bertini is a social and medical anthropologist with extensive experience of interdisciplinary health research, where she brings her expertise in ethnographic research methods, critical medical anthropology, and co-production to address health inequities.

In 2020, she joined Brighton and Sussex Medical School (BSMS) and the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Applied Research Collaboration Kent, Surrey and Sussex (ARC KSS) as Research Fellow in Public Health, where she has worked on several research and implementation projects that focus on the interface between public health and adult social care. Dr Bertini has contributed to establish a portfolio of public health research in homecare and care homes.

She holds a PhD in Social and Medical Anthropology from the University of Sussex. Her doctoral research was multi-sited ethnography of practices and discourses of ‘obesity’ management in the UK, with a focus on both policy and practice. Drawing on critical medical anthropology and fat studies, this work contributes to current debates on fatphobia, weight stigma, and 'healthy eating' in public health and healthcare.

Research

Lavinia’s research interests are situated within critical medical anthropology, critical public health, social justice and applied qualitative research. Her research interrogates the social reproduction of identity linked to health, class, gender, and age in public health and health and social care policy and practice. Her research interests include health inequities in policy and practice; infection control in adult social care settings; food-related interventions in public health and social care; fatphobia and weight-stigma in public health and healthcare.

Doctoral supervision

Lavinia would be happy to consider proposals related to any of the above fields.

Teaching

Lavinia has extensive teaching experience and has designed and delivered lectures, seminars and workshops for students from different backgrounds.

She has taught BA and MA students in Anthropology, International Development and Sociology, on modules including Health, Poverty and Inequality, Ethnographic Research Methods and Anthropology of Food. A full list of modules can be found on her elements profile here >

She is interested in developing and applying inclusive and innovative teaching methods. She promotes a classroom environment where students feel safe to discuss, debate, question and reflect on issues. She encourages students to develop critical thinking and confidence as well as being creative and collaborative.

She has experience in supervising ethnographic and qualitative projects. She interested in supervising post-graduate qualitative, mixed-methods and applied research in health and care services, health policy related to weight-management, ‘healthy lifestyle’ and ‘healthy eating’, health inequalities, medicalisation and the production of knowledge in biomedical settings and public health.

Selected publications

Rand, S., Bertini, L., Dargan, A. and Raats, M. 2024. The Role of Homecare in Addressing Food and Drink Care-Related Needs and Supporting Outcomes for Older Adults: An International Scoping Review. Journal of Long-Term Care, (2024), pp. 514–534. DOI: https://doi.org/10.31389/jltc.304.

Rand, S., Bertini, L., Dargan, A., Raats, M., & Sharp, R. (2024). Developing a framework for reflection on policy-relevant care research using a study of older adults’ food and drink care-related needs. International Journal of Care and Caring, 8(1), 199-205. https://doi.org/10.1332/23978821Y2023D000000018.

Jeffery, S., Monkhouse, J., Bertini, L., Walker, S., & Sharp, R. (2023). Discharge to Assess: an evaluation of three case studies in the southeast of England to inform service improvement. BMJ open quality, 12(4), e002515. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjoq-2023-002515.

Bertini, L. et al. (2023) Care Workers and Managers’ Experiences of Implementing Infection Control Guidance in an Epidemic Context: A Qualitative Study in the South East of England, during the COVID-19 Prevaccination Era. Health & Social Care in the Community, https://dx.doi.org/10.1155/2023/4127871.

Jeffery, S. et al. (2023) Does a discharge to assess programme introduced in England meet the quadruple aim of service improvement?’, Journal of integrated care. 31(1):16-25, https://dx.doi.org/10.1108/jica-02-2022-0018.

Kiss, I. Z., et al. (2023) How can risk of COVID-19 transmission be minimised in domiciliary care for older people: development, parameterisation and initial results of a simple mathematical model, Epidemiology and Infection. 150, e13, 1–6. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0950268821002727.

Bertini, L. et al. (2021) ‘COVID-19 management in social care in England: a systematic review of changing policies and newspaper reported staff perspectives’, medRxiv, p. 2021.11.17.21266410. doi: 10.1101/2021.11.17.21266410.