News 2018-19

News and events from the Primary Care and Public Health department.

October 2019

Dental X-rays may increase the risk of thyroid cancer and meningioma

Research by a BSMS team led by Professor Anjum Memon, Chair in Epidemiology and Public Health Medicine, showed that repeated exposures to dental X-rays may be associated with an increased risk of thyroid cancer and meningioma (tumour of the layers of tissue called meninges that surround/protect the brain and spinal cord - most meningiomas are benign in nature and grow very slowly). About 3,500 new cases of thyroid cancer and 1,850 cases of meningiomas are diagnosed each year in the UK, and the incidence of both cancers has increased in many countries during the past three decades. For thyroid cancer, much of this increase is probably due to increased surveillance, screening and over-diagnosis (i.e. detection of a cancer that would not ultimately cause symptoms), but the researchers believe other causes need investigation.

Read the dental x-rays and thyroid cancer article >

September 2019

Astrodem Student Intern Secures PhD Place

Joanne Sheppard, a University of Sussex Physics undergraduate student who worked with the Astrodem team as a Junior Research Associate in the summer of 2018, has gone on to successfully secure a funded PhD place at UCL in the newly formed UKRI Centre for Doctoral Training in AI-enabled Healthcare. Joanne worked with Liz programming machine learning models using a big dataset of primary care patient records, to try to find patients with dementia who were not yet given a formal diagnosis and her work will shortly be submitted for publication. We wish Joanne every success in her future studies!

May 2019

Medical school and partner universities contribute to one-stop health resource

Academics from BSMS and the Universities of Sussex and Brighton have made a major contribution to the third edition of The Cambridge Handbook of Psychology, Health and Medicine, published by Cambridge University Press. Carrie Llewellyn, Professor of Applied Behavioural Medicine at BSMS, is lead editor of the book, which provides a comprehensive, accessible, one-stop resource for doctors, healthcare professionals, mental healthcare professionals (such as psychologists, counsellors, specialist nurses), academics, researchers and students specialising in health across all these fields.

BSMS duo give evidence at the House of Commons

Carrie Llewellyn, Professor of Applied Behavioural Medicine, and Dr Duncan Shrewsbury, Senior Lecturer in General Practice at BSMS, gave evidence to the Women and Equalities Committee at the House of Commons on 1 May based on a written submission of evidence made last year to the Health and Social Care and LGBT communities inquiry. The pair discussed how frontline health staff can be more LGBT inclusive and revealed the long-term mental health problems faced by LGBT patients.

Watch our LGBT inclusivity presentation here >

April 2019

Face-to-face HIV testing preferred option by men who have sex with men

The majority of men who have sex with men (MSM) would prefer face-to-face HIV testing by a healthcare professional (HCP) out of a range of testing options, a new collaborative study shows. The paper was published in Plos Medicine.

more about our study into face to face HIV testing >

March 2019

Sharing your healthcare data safely

On Thursday 28 March, Dr Liz Ford, Senior Lecturer in Primary Care Research at BSMS, led the organisation of a public workshop at the Alan Turing Institute, a national institute of data science and artificial intelligence, based in London. Entitled 'Sharing your healthcare data safely', the workshop invited the public to comment on risks and potential safeguards for sharing the free text data from letters, notes and reports in patients' medical records, for use in research.

February 2019

Our data, our society, our health

Dr Liz Ford, Senior Lecturer in Primary Care Research at BSMS, was in the first cohort of the Future Leaders scheme at the Farr Institute for Health Informatics Research (which existed between 2013-2018 and has been superseded by Health Data Research-UK). Alongside other early and mid-career academics from 12 institutions, her cohort worked together to present a new vision for health data science for the UK and beyond, which is centred on inclusivity and transparency. The position paper is published in Learning Health Systems journal and is open access.

more on our vision for health data science >

December 2018

Submission made to the Women and Equalities Committees inquiry

Prof Carrie Llewellyn and Alex Pollard made a recent submission to the Government's Women and Equalities Committees inquiry into Health and social care and LGBT communities. The inquiry is to consider whether LGBT health care provisions are adequate. They have recently been advised that their submission has been accepted as evidence although the committee has yet to report.

October 2018

Best paper award for Dr Shrewsbury

Dr Duncan Shrewsbury was awarded the “Association for Medical Education in Europe’s inaugural Best Paper award for MedEdPublish” at this year’s annual conference for the following paper: ‘Problematizing medical students with disabilities: a critical policy analysis’ and draws on a post-structural interpretative policy analysis method developed by Australian feminist scholar Prof Carol Bacchi.

Problematizing medical students with disabilities >

September 2018

Scabies paper published

Jo Middleton, along with Prof Jackie Cassell, Dr Chris Jones and Stefania Lanza, has had 'Scabies control: the forgotten role of personal hygiene – Authors' reply' published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases, 18 p1068-1069.

Scabies control and personal hygiene paper >

July 2018

Dr Bremner co-author of recently published article in the International Journal of Methods and Psychiatric Research

Dr Stephen Bremner, Senior Lecturer in Medical Statistics, has had the following published, for which he is co-author: Greenberg L, Bremner S, Carr C, Priebe S (2018) Clinicians have several therapeutic relationships and patients only one: The effect on their assessments of relationships. International Journal of Methods in Psychiatric Research.

BSMS lecturer invited to “unconference” at Google

Dr Elizabeth Ford, Lecturer in Research Methodology, was invited to attend an “unconference”, called Google Scifoo Camp, held near San Francisco, USA. This was held over three days at the end of June in Google’s semi-secret research-and-development facility, Google X campus, with 300 invited participants from all over the world. Dr Ford organised a discussion session entitled “From innovation to implementation: how to engage end users in the scientific process and pipeline for real world impact” which was well attended. She made some great connections with other international academics who work with health big data, as well as industry representatives. Dr Ford has also completed her Postgraduate certificate in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education at the University of Brighton, with Merit.

June 2018

Studies into filaggrin-related eczema and asthma published

A simple saliva gene test that can be done anytime in life, including at birth or early childhood, could help predict the long-term risk of more severe disease and long-term healthcare costs for individuals with common chronic conditions such as eczema and asthma. A new study by BSMS, published in the British Journal of Dermatology, identifies the potential of testing for changes in the filaggrin gene to help predict future healthcare needs. The study was led by Professor Somnath Mukhopadhyay, Chair in Paediatrics at BSMS, with Senior Lecturer Dr Katy Fidler and PhD student Patricia Soares.

Testing for changes in the filaggrin gene >

Study published on the usefulness of health education materials in GP waiting rooms

Dr Priyamvada Paudyal, Lecturer in Public Health and Course Leader for MSc in Public Health at BSMS, recently had the following paper accepted in the British Journal of General Practice with her MSc student Katherine Maskell and former colleague, Paula McDonald: Maskell, K, McDonald, P, Paudyal, P (2018) The usefulness of health education materials in GP waiting rooms: cross-sectional study. British Journal of General Practice.

Dr Elaney Youssef has HIV paper accepted in the International Journal of STD & AIDS and wins BHIVA/BASHH award

Dr Elaney Youssef, Visting Research Assistant at BSMS, had a paper accepted in the International Journal of STD & AIDS for a project she previously worked on: “HIV testing in patients presenting with indicator conditions in outpatient settings: offer and uptake rates, and educational and active interventions”. She also presented results from one of her PhD studies at the British HIV Association (BHIVA) with the British Association for Sexual Health and HIV (BASHH) conference in April and won a ‘BHIVA/BASHH commended oral research presentation award’. The presentation was also covered on the aidsmap website.

April 2018

Dr Cassie Hazell’s has book ‘An Introduction to Self-help for Distressing Voices’ published

Dr Cassie Hazell, Research Fellow, has had a book titled ‘An Introduction to Self-help for Distressing Voices’ published.

introduction to self-help for distressing voices >

Pioneering work published on scabies in residential care homes

Jo Middleton and Prof Jackie Cassell have had a paper published with colleagues from the University of Manchester on ‘Scabies in residential care homes: Modelling, inference and interventions for well-connected population sub-units’.

more on scabies in residential care homes >

March 2018

Stefania Lanza to support research on care home quality at the Rudd Centre

Stefania Lanza will be supporting Prof Gordon Harold (Director) and Prof Jackie Cassell (Deputy Director) as the Research Coordinator at the Andrew and Virginia Rudd Centre for Adoption Research and Practice. Stefania will continue to support Prof Jackie Cassell with NIHR-funded care home study 'Measuring and Improving Care Home Quality' (MiCare HQs). Stefania said: "I am really excited about working closely with Gordon, Jackie and the Rudd Centre, helping to shape and coordinate the research strategy across the university in this vitally important area of work. I am particularly looking forward to developing relationships with a wide range of practitioners, parents and vulnerable children and helping to make a real impact on their lives".

BSMS researcher receives BHIVA/BASHH science scholarship

Researchers at BSMS have assessed the prevalence of podoconiosis (podo) in Cameroon. Despite the disease being reported in more than 32 countries, Ethiopia is the only country where podo risk has been extensively mapped to date. Commenting on the new work, Dr Kebebe Deribe, Postdoctoral Research Fellow at BSMS, said: "We have clear prevention and control strategies, and can beat this disabling disease in one generation. The elimination of podo requires a combination of political will, policy formulation and operational and financial commitment by governments of endemic countries and donors."