The Health Improvement Network (THIN) research team

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Staff

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Coordinating staff

Irene Petersen PhD, Senior Lecturer in Epidemiology and Medical Statistics

Dr Irene Petersen is based at the Department of Primary Care & Population Health, UCL. Her work is focused on epidemiological research arising from primary care databases. She has considerable experience in design and analysis of these data from studies in infectious disease, mental health, cardiovascular diseases and pharmaco-epidemiology. She chairs a methodological users group with members across universities and research institutions in southern England.

Laura Horsfall PhD, Research Associate

Laura joined the PCPH department in early January 2009 as a Research Associate in Clinical Database Research. With a background in genetics and health services research, Laura is currently using THIN data to look at the epidemiology and outcomes associated with a common genetic condition. The work will form the final chapter of her PhD thesis in Human Genetics, which she has been undertaking part-time at the UCL Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment since 2005. She is also involved with developing standard operating procedures for undertaking research using primary care databases.

Team

Ruth Blackburn MSc, PhD Student

Ruth started a full time PhD in September 2012 and is working on the PRIMROSE programme, which is jointly led by the departments of Mental Health Sciences and Primary Care and Population Health.  PRIMROSE is a 5 year National Institute for Health Research funded programme to investigate cardiovascular disease risk in people with severe mental illness; Ruth’s PhD will focus on using THIN data to explore inequalities in the provision of cardiovascular interventions to people with severe mental illness.  Ruth has an MSc in Public Health and previously worked as an epidemiologist for the Health Protection Agency.

Shuk-Li Collings BSc, PhD Student

Shuk-Li is a full-time PhD student in the department. She joined in October 2010 on a MRC Industrial CASE studentship which is in collaboration with CSD MR UK. Her background is in statistics however her project is an epidemiological study which uses THIN to investigate the effects of using antiepileptic drugs in pregnancy on the mother and child. Her previous experience with THIN includes working with Dr Irene Petersen on a study of prescribing patterns of antidepressants in pregnant women.

Hilary Davies RD, MSc, PhD Student

Hilary started her PhD at the Primary Care and Population Health Department in October 2012. Her PhD will focus on maternal alcohol and illicit drug intake and neonatal abstinence syndrome. She will be analysing a linked cohort using THIN and HES data. Qualitative studies will also be conducted to examine primary care recordings and maternal perceptions of moderate alcohol and illicit and non-illicit drug use during pregnancy.

Hilary’s PhD is being funded by a scholarship from the NIHR School of Primary Care Research. She has a research MSc and has previously worked as registered dietitian in the NHS and lecturer at St Mary’s University College, London.

Sarah Hardoon PhD, Research Associate/ Statistician

Sarah joined the THIN research group in May 2011. Her current work is focussed on cardiovascular diseases, particularly in relation to mental health. In particular, she is working on a research study to develop and validate a cardiovascular disease risk prediction tool specific to patients with severe mental illness, using the THIN database. She is also working on a project to examine how cardiovascular risk factors may be associated with dementia risk. Sarah has an MSc in Medical Statistics and a PhD in Epidemiology/ Applied Medical Statistics on analysing time trends in coronary heart disease and type 2 diabetes.

Rebecca Lodwick MSc, Research Associate

Rebecca joined the THIN research group in January 2013 to work on a project with the Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Unit, using THIN data to study the health of cohabitees of terminally ill patients. She was previously based in the HIV Epidemiology & Biostatistics group at UCL.

Louise Marston PhD, Senior Research Statistician

Louise joined the Department of Primary Care and Population Health in August 2008 after previously working at Brunel University and St George’s, University of London.  Since then she has worked on a number of studies using THIN.  She has looked at missing data in recent THIN data, and has gone on to look at specific health indicators which may be challenging to accurately impute under standard assumptions made in multiple imputation.  She is also working on a project looking at panic syndrome in those who have experienced their first coronary heart disease event.  She has also worked on a project looking at the incidence of insomnia in THIN and another project looking at congenital malformations in women who take antidepressants during pregnancy. 

Rachel McCrea PhD, Research Associate

Rachel joined the THIN research group in April 2013 after completing a PhD at the UCL Mental Health Sciences Unit. She is currently working on a project using the THIN database to look at the risks and benefits of psychotropic medication taken during pregnancy. Her PhD was in the field of psychometric epidemiology: in this she investigated whether hybrid latent variable models that combine continuous and discrete latent variables (factor mixture models) can be useful for resolving controversies surrounding the classification of psychiatric disorders, in particular the anxiety and depressive disorders. Rachel has an MSc in Social Statistics and has previously worked for the Government Statistical Service.

Cathy Welch MSc, Research Assistant/PhD Student

Cathy joined the PCPH department as a Research Associate in December 2009. She is trained as a Medical Statistician and she is applying this knowledge to investigate methods of imputing missing data in longitudinal clinical databases. The aim of this project is to develop new methods to impute missing data in the THIN database. The results found from this study will form Cathy's PhD.

Linda Wijlaars MSc, PhD Student

Linda started her PhD project at the PCPH department in October 2010. After completing her Masters in Epidemiology and Human Pathobiology at the Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands, she is now focusing her research on childhood depression. Linda is using THIN to study the epidemiology of childhood depression and the influence of parental postnatal depression (of both mothers and fathers) on children's future depression. Her PhD is being sponsored by a scholarship from the NIHR School of Primary Care Research. She also writes news articles for BioNews, and the occasional blog for Significance magazine.