My PhD Title: Differential effects of smoking, alcohol consumption, and diet on all-cause and cause-specific mortality across strata of socioeconomic position
Supervisor: At UCL, Prof. David Batty; at University of Lausanne, Prof. Pedro Marques-Vidal and Dr. Silvia Stringhini
Lay summary:Health behaviors such as smoking, excessive alcohol consumption, unhealthy diets, and physical inactivity are well-known modifiable risk factors for chronic diseases. These modifiable risk factors are strongly associated with socioeconomic position (SEP), whereby less privileged people tend to smoke and drink more, exercise less, and follow less healthy diets than their more privileged counterparts. Accordingly, people of lower SEP disproportionally suffer and die from chronic diseases in high-income countries. These modifiable risk factors have been extensively studied as mediators of the socioeconomic gradient in chronic disease; however, little to no research has examined these risk factors as effect modifiers in the association between SEP and chronic disease. Thus, the overall aim of this project is to elucidate the way in which SEP interacts with health behaviors to affect all-cause and cause-specific mortality.
My Background I did my undergraduate studies at Harvard University, majoring in Human Evolutionary Biology and fulfilling premedical requirements. I later travelled to the Philippines where I interned at the World Health Organization regional headquarters for the Western Pacific Region and conducted research on the socioeconomic and gender inequalities in health in Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu. This pushed me to pursue a graduate degree in Epidemiology at the University of Basel and the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute in Basel, Switzerland. For the research portion of my studies, I travelled to Sao Paulo, Brazil where I learned Portuguese and evaluated the effect of Internet usage among men who have sex with men to meet each other on the risk of sexually transmitted infections. After this I started a PhD in social and nutritional epidemiology at the University of Lausanne, Switzerland, entitled "Socioeconomic determinants of diet and the contribution of diet to socioeconomic inequalities in cardiometabolic disorders in high-income countries." In the spring of 2017, I received a doctoral mobility fellowship from the Swiss National Science Foundation to undertake a fellowship at UCL as a visiting research student to expand my research skills, after which I will return to Switzerland to conclude my PhD studies.
Qualifications
1. B.A. in Human Evolutionary Biology, 2011, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, United States
2. M.Sc. in Epidemiology, Magna Cum Laude, 2014, University of Basel, Basel, Switzerland
Awards
1. Best article in Public Health, top five recognition, Swiss School of Public Health, Basel, Switzerland (Nov 2017)
2. Prix de la Fondation de Medecine Sociale et Preventive, University of Lausanne, Switzerland (Oct 2017; 2200 GBP)
3. Travel grant to World Congress of Epidemiology in Saitama, Japan, from University of Lausanne Foundation (Aug 2017 ; 1000 GBP)
4. Doctoral Mobility Fellowship, Swiss National Science Foundation (May 2017; 42500 GBP)
5. Nestle Prix de la Nutrition, Young Researcher Award, Nestle Suisse, Vevey, Switzerland (Aug 2016; 5500 GBP)
Publications
1. de Mestral C. Considerations for County-Level Inequalities in Life Expectancy. JAMA Intern Med. 2017;177(11):1697-1698.
2. de Mestral C, Khalatbari-Soltani S, Stringhini S, Marques-Vidal P. Fifteen-year trends in the prevalence of barriers to healthy eating in a high-income country. Am J Clin Nutr. 2017;105(3):660-668.
3. de Mestral C, Marques-Vidal P, Gaspoz JM, Theler JM, Guessous I. Independent association between socioeconomic indicators and macro- and micro-nutrient intake in Switzerland. PLoS One. 2017;12(4):e0174578.
4. de Mestral C, Mayen AL, Petrovic D, Marques-Vidal P, Bochud M, Stringhini S. Socioeconomic Determinants of Sodium Intake in Adult Populations of High-Income Countries: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis. Am J Public Health. 2017;107(4):e1-e12.
5. de Mestral C, Stringhini S. Socioeconomic Status and Cardiovascular Disease: an Update. Curr Cardiol Rep. 2017;19(11):115.
6. de Mestral C, Stringhini S, Marques-Vidal P. Barriers to healthy eating in Switzerland: A nationwide study. Clin Nutr. 2016;35(6):1490-1498.
7. Khalatbari-Soltani S, de Mestral C, Marques-Vidal P. Sixteen years trends in reported undernutrition. Clin Nutr. 2018.
8. Khalatbari-Soltani S, de Mestral C, Waeber G, Marques-Vidal P. Large regional disparities in prevalence, management and reimbursement of hospital undernutrition. Eur J Clin Nutr. 2018.
9. Mayen AL, de Mestral C, Zamora G, et al. Interventions promoting healthy eating as a tool for reducing social inequalities in diet in low- and middle-income countries: a systematic review. Int J Equity Health. 2016;15(1):205.
Appointments
1. Visiting research student, Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, University College London (Sept 2017 - Jun 2018)
2. Doctoral assistant, Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine, University of Lausanne Hospital, Lausanne, Switzerland (Feb 2015 - present)
Contact details carlos.demestral.17(at)ucl.ac.uk
cdemestral(at)gmail.com