In 2014, I joined the Institute for Health and Human Development as Research Fellow, with a co-ordinating role on the ‘REACH Pregnancy Programme’. This is a five-year programme of research funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR; £2 million) that is concerned with how to improve access and experience of antenatal care for pregnant women living in areas with high levels of poverty and high ethnic diversity. I work on aspects of project management across the programme and I have a leading role on the ‘Community REACH’ study, a cluster randomised controlled trial to improve early uptake of antenatal care in communities in North and East London, and in Essex. I am also leading a systematic review of the evidence on service user involvement in the planning, monitoring and improvement of maternity services. From 2012-2014, I worked as a postdoctoral research fellow at Barts and the London School of Medicine and Dentistry, where I co-ordinated the qualitative research arm of the ‘HepFree’ study, an NIHR Programme Grant for Applied Research aimed at developing and testing primary care-based screening for chronic viral hepatitis in high-risk immigrant communities. I also conducted qualitative research for the EU-funded ‘HEPScreen Project’ pilot trial of primary care-based screening for viral hepatitis in East London. I have an Honours Degree in Psychology from Trinity College Dublin (2005) and a PhD from the School of Public Health and Population Science at University College Dublin (2011). My doctoral research aimed to inform the development of community-based mental health and suicide prevention strategies, by identifying key factors in the response to psychological distress and suicide risk within young male social networks, and to explore the outcomes of peer suicide bereavement for young adult males. Prior to my PhD studies I worked as a research assistant at the UCD Geary Institute, where I was involved in a number of research projects concerned with health risk behaviours and ageing.

Qualitative research methods Health inequalities Public understanding of illness Antenatal and maternity care research Suicide research