Health economics; public health; technology assessment; resource economics; COVID-19 (Coronavirus); health economics; economics of health care; health services research

• Director, Health Economics Consulting, UEA

Professional Qualifications and professional memberships

• BA (Hons) Economics/Economic History, University of York
• MA Health Services Studies, University of Leeds
• PhD Health Economics, University of Western Australia
• Fellow of the Faculty of Public Health (FFPH) by distinction
• Health Economists Study Group, UK

Research interests

• economics of public health & social care
• priority setting methods in healthcare and public health
• economics of drug prevention and treatment
• return on investment in healthcare
• economics of bone health
• economics of alternative therapies
• economic evaluation of orthopaedics, joint replacement and falls, the subject of my doctoral thesis

Ric’s research covers the development of priority setting techniques in complex decision making environments and he has adapted these for appropriate use in the practice of public health and World Class commissioning. His other work covers the use of economic evaluation techniques in wider public health and social issues such as obesity and food consumption, physical activity, drug and alcohol mis-use, parenting programmes, assistive technologies and other social care interventions. Throughout all these investigations he is interested in identifying, attributing and measuring the widest possible set of social and economic costs and benefits derived from these types of programme.

Ric has a longstanding interest too in the economics of orthopaedics and associated quality of life (the subject of his PhD). He is a Co-investigator and lead Health Economist on the MRC’s SCCOP project, an multi-centre economic evaluation of screening for osteoporosis in elderly women. 
 

Selected Publications

Abubakar I, L Irvine, CF Aldus, GM Wyatt, RJ Fordham, S Schelenz, L Shepstone, A Howe, M Peck, PR Hunter. (2007) ‘A systematic review of the clinical, public health and cost-effectiveness of rapid diagnostic tests for the detection and identification of bacterial intestinal pathogens in faeces and food’.  Health Technology Assessment Sep;11(36):1-216

Fordham RJ, Jones L, Sumnall HR, McVeigh J, Bellis MA. (2007) ‘The economics of preventing drug use: an introduction to the issues’ National Collaborating Centre for Drug Prevention of the National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence ISBN 978-1-902051-505

Wilson E, Sussex J, Macleod & Fordham RJ. (2007) ‘Prioritizing health technologies in a Primary Care Trust’ J. Health Services Research and Policy Vol.12, No.2 April 2007

Wilson E, Fordham RJ. (2006) ‘Essential Thrombocythaemia: anagrelide or interferon-??  A cost-utility analysis’. Haematologica 91(s1):300

Heller R, Gemmel I, Wilson E, Fordham RJ, Smith RD.  (2006) ‘Using economic analyses for local priority setting: the population cost-impact approach’. Journal of Applied Health Economics and Health Policy 5(1):45-54

Wilson E, Rees J & Fordham RJ.  (2006) ‘Developing a prioritization framework in an English Primary Care Trust’  Cost Effectiveness and Resource Allocation  (17.2.06), 4:3  & Open Access see:  http:/www.resource-allocation.com/content/4/1/3

Miles S, Fordham RJ, Mills C, Valovirta E, Mugford M. (2005) ‘A framework for measuring the costs to society of IgE-mediated food allergy’  Allergy  60: 996-1003

Loxley W, Fordham RJ et al. (2004) ‘The prevention of substance use, risk and harm in Australia - a review of the evidence’. Ministerial Council on Drug Strategy monograph, Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing ISBN:0 642 82482 7

 
Senior Lecturer for Health Economics at Norwich Medical School.   MBBS medical degree.

My goal is to span the understanding between academic and professional realms. I am an applied economist, research practitioner and teacher who uses economic methods in working alongside other
disciplines in the interests of building better health systems in the real world.

I have worked both in the NHS as a manager and consulted to various NHS bodies. I have also worked in the Australian and German health systems. As a former Associate Dean for Knowledge
Transfer I work with my clients in solving their actual problems and finding them the best possible solutions.

My early years were spent working at the Institute of Social and Economic Research,York for Alan Williams from whom I learned the art of 'working with what one has, not what one would necessarily
like' but in the most rigorous ways possible!

Website: http://healtheconomicsconsulting.co.uk/contact.html