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My PhD Title: Socioeconomic impacts on healthy ageing in the US, England, China and Japan
Supervisor: Professor Amanda Sacker; Dr Hynek Pikhart
Lay summary: My PhD project focuses on examining socioeconomic impacts on healthy ageing in the US, England, China and Japan, using data from the Health and Retirement Study (HRS), the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA), the China Health and Retirement Longitudinal Study (CHARLS) and the Japanese Study of Aging and Retirement (JSTAR). It aims at assessing longitudinal relationships between socioeconomic indicators (e.g. education, income, wealth or occupation) and healthy ageing trajectories after 60 years among American, English, Chinese and Japanese ageing population; and comparing the magnitude of the socioeconomic inequalities of healthy ageing between western and Asian countries.
My Background I studied Public Administration (in Health Informatics) at Beijing University of Chinese Medicine between 2009 and 2014, and gained an MSc in Social Epidemiology at UCL in 2014/2015. During my undergraduate study, I worked as an intern and a national standing committee member for the China Family Planning Association, to conduct youth projects related to sexual and reproductive health and rights, and HIV prevention in China. Those experiences provided me with a broader overview of the health inequality status quo in China, and raised my awareness of the immense challenges of absolute and relative deprivation still faced by China. In order to explore more in social determinants of health inequalities in a worldwide, in 2014, I chose to study social epidemiology at UCL. The one-year master programme at UCL made me realise that social inequalities in health and the rate of poverty and deprivation are major themes in public health research and policy debates in both western and Asian countries. In 2015, I decided to continue my study at UCL as a PhD student, focusing on studying socioeconomic inequalities of healthy ageing in both western and eastern countries.
Qualifications
· PhD candidate in Epidemiology and Public Health at UCL, Oct 2015-Present
· MSc in Health and Society: Social Epidemiology, Pass with Distinction at UCL, Sept 2014-Sept 2015
· Bachelor in Public Administration (Health Informatics) at Beijing University of Chinese Medicine, Sept 2009-June 2014
Awards
UCL Oversea Research Scholarship in 2016
Prize for Best Summer Project in Social Epidemiology of UCL in 2015
The Michael Marmot UCL Studentship in Social Epidemiology in 2014
Youth Scholarship for the 11th International Congress on AIDS in Asia and the Pacific in 2013
Publications
Lu W, Benson R, Glaser K, et al, Relationship between employment histories and frailty trajectories in later life: evidence from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health, 02 December 2016.
[Accepted] Lu W, Pikhart H & Sacker A, Domains and measurements of healthy ageing in epidemiological studies: a review, The Gerontologist. 2018
Appointments
Data Manager (part-time) Feb 2016-Aug 2018
Working for UCL Central and Eastern European Health Research Group: coordination and rationalisation of the processing of data in Health, Alcohol and Psychosocial factors In Eastern Europe (HAPIEE Study) through its various stages.
Contact details (email, twitter handle, Instagram etc.)
Email: wentian.lu.14@ucl.ac.uk or lu.wentian@live.cn
Office address: Room 350, ESRC International Centre for Lifecourse Studies in Society and Health (ICLS), Research Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, UCL, 1-19 Torrington Place, London WC1E 7HB
