Public Mental Health, Workplace Wellbeing, Sleep and Fatigue in Workforces, Emergency Responder Health and Wellbeing, Mindfulness, Psychiatric Epidemiology

I am interested in public health approaches to mental health, especially how to promote mentally healthy workplaces. I am a psychiatric epidemiologist and have been a registered psychologist earlier in my career.

My work programme is addressing an NHS national priority area on how to attract and retain a workforce through improving the way we support staff and learners in the health and social care systems. Current projects of my team include: exploring strategies to improve sleep quality and reduce fatigue in health staff; how to promote mental health and reduce suicide risk in ambulance staff; and supporting the wellbeing of learners including PhD students and psychological trainees. I am Theme Lead for NIHR Applied Research Collaboration (ARC) East of England Mental Health Over the Life Course, where I also lead the Workforce Wellbeing work stream. I am a Fellow of the Royal Society for Public Health and a member of the Society for Occupational Health, and regularly review for journals and grant bodies in my field including NIHR.

I have collaborated and supervised across the health and social sciences including medical specialties, public health, nursing, psychology, business, economics, and sociology. I am an experienced PhD supervisor, having worked with 18 PhD students to date. 

For full publication list see https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3132-2745

Prior to relocating to the UK in 2017 I was a Chief Investigator on competitive grants totalling AU$9.8 million, including a highly competitive Australian Research Council (ARC) Future Fellowship plus project support from both the Australian National Health & Medical Research Council (NHMRC) and the Australian Research Council. I had been continuously funded by NHMRC for 17 years (2003-2019). I have served on 13 national grant review panels (selection panels) in health and medical research and chaired a state-wide scientific review ethics committee. 

Co-Director of Research, School of Health Sciences

Mental health and wellbeing of health and social care workforce

Sleep and fatigue in high-risk workforces

Health of shift-workers

Public mental health

Mental health epidemiology

Workplace health promotion

Mindfulness and positive psychology interventions

Doctoral training

Professionalism, self-care, and creating healthy workplaces

Sleep and fatigue for health professionals