David is Professor of Public Health and Policy at the University of Liverpool, and Professor of Child Public Health at the University of Copenhagen. He works clinically as a Consultant in Public Health at Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in Liverpool. He is a co-Investigator with PHIRST LiLaC.
David co-leads Liverpool’s Health Inequalities Policy Research group (HIPR). HIPR’s research focusses on improving health and reducing inequalities through the study of the determinants of health and wellbeing and the policies that impact them. David recently co-led the N8/NHSA Child of the North initiative, focussed on post-COVID levelling up for child health and wellbeing.
Sarah Rodgers is Professor of Health Informatics at University of Liverpool and co-Investigator with PHIRST LiLaC. Sarah is a health data scientist with methodological expertise in evaluating complex public health interventions and policy changes using large routinely collected administrative datasets. She is particularly interested in working with local governments to harness data collected in sectors not usually thought to impact health, to inform local and national disease prevention strategies to reduce health inequity.
Her research focuses on using safe haven data that have been linked across health, social and environmental domains to explore the impact of exposures such as decent housing conditions, alcohol outlets, pollution, and natural outdoor spaces, on health and wellbeing. Since 2018 Sarah has also led the Care and Health Informatics theme of the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration for the North West Coast and is capacity building lead for LiLaC as part of NIHR School for Public Health Research.
Iain Buchan is Chair in Public Health and Clinical Informatics and Associate Pro Vice Chancellor for Innovation at the University of Liverpool. As a public health physician and data scientist, he recently led world-first evaluation of mass rapid antigen testing, risk-mitigated reopening of mass events for UK COVID-19 responses, and designed the Civic Data Cooperative and Combined Intelligence for Population Health Action. Previously, he founded Manchester’s health informatics research centre and over £150m of research. Qualified in pharmacology, medicine, public health, statistics and informatics, he is a Fellow of the American College of Medical Informatics and won the 2022 Faculty of Public Health Alwyn-Smith Prize.
Iain is a co-Investigator with PHIRST LiLaC.
Jennie Popay is Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Public Health at Lancaster University. She is a co-Investigator and with Irum Durrani is PHIRST LiLaC’s co-lead for public involvement. Her research interests include the social determinants of health and health equity; the evaluation of place-based policies/interventions; community empowerment; and the sociology of knowledge. She has been involved in producing three online resources: https://forequity.uk – to support researchers to strengthen the equity focus of their research; https://neighbourhoodresilience.uk to support place-based public health initiatives to deliver co-ordinated action to improve the social determinants of health and wellbeing; and http://piiaf.org.uk to support evaluation of public involvement in research. She is currently Chair of the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration North West Coast Steering Board and was previously lead for public and partner engagement in the NIHR CLAHRC North West Coast and Lead for Public involvement and engagement in the NIHR School for Public Health Research.
Bruce Hollingsworth is Professor of Health Economics at Lancaster University and lead for the Health Economics at Lancaster. He is a co-Investigator with PHIRST LiLaC. His research is principally in the area of efficiency measurement with respect to the production of health and health care, social determinants of health, and the translation of research into practice. He is Senior Editor of Health Economics, Co-Organiser of the UK Health Economists Study Group, and on The Board of the European Health Economics Association.
Karen Broadhurst is Professor of Social Work at Lancaster University and a co-Investigator with PHIRST LiLaC.
Dr Sakthi Karunanithi is Director of Public Health with Lancashire County Council and co-Investigator with PHIRST LiLaC.
Matt was appointed Director of Public Health for Liverpool City Council in April 2020 and leads a team of 35 people covering a range of public health activities including the commissioning of public health services, health protection, health improvement, health care public health, embedding health in all policies approaches, and addressing the wider determinants of health.
Matt’s appointment is joint with the University of Liverpool, and as an Honorary Professor with the Department of Public Health and Policy he is creating opportunities to identify and develop evidence based policy interventions that can be embedded into local practice to innovatively improve health and reduce inequalities.
Matt was previously Director of Public Health for both Sefton and Knowsley separately, and Joint Director of Public Health for Knowsley and Sefton between February 2016 and August 2018.
Matt lives in Liverpool with his wife and 2 young children. He is passionate about bringing together the best minds in the region to improve health & wellbeing and reduce inequalities in the communities we serve, and working with, for and through communities to allow this to happen. His mission is to make the world a better place, starting with Liverpool.
Matt is a practice co-applicant with PHIRST LiLaC
Dr Cobus Olivier is a Public Health Research Manager at the University of Bristol in the Centre for Public Health. He manages the programmes of work associated with PHIRST and the School of Public Health Research at the University of Bristol. He brings expertise in years of managing Public Health programmes as part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in South Africa.
Charis Bontoft is a Research Assistant at PHIRST Connect. She has an Undergraduate degree in Psychology. Previously, Charis has been employed as a Research Assistant with Northumbria University and Amsterdam University of Applied Sciences, conducting investigating remote management during COVID-19, and scholarly activity respectively. She has also worked as a support worker at a forensic mental health hospital. Her key areas of interest include: public health, chronic health conditions, physical and mental wellbeing.
Imogen Freethy is a Research Assistant at PHIRST Connect. She has an Undergraduate degree in Psychology and has worked as honorary Assistant Psychologist in at the Aneurin Bevan University Health Board. She has authored work in the Clinical Psychology forum on the effectiveness of an adapted Dialectical Behavioural Therapy program for mothers with emotional dysregulation. Her key areas of interest include: public health, physical and mental wellbeing, preventative health strategies, and early intervention services.
Dr Olujoke Fakoya is a Research Fellow at PHIRST Connect. Her research interests centre upon improving the mental health and wellbeing of the population. She graduated with a first-class undergraduate degree in Public Health at Anglia Ruskin University and recently completed a PhD in Public Health which was obtained at Queen’s University Belfast. Her PhD thesis explored community-based interventions aimed at alleviating loneliness and social isolation among older people. Her key areas of expertise include: Realist evaluation methodology, theory-based evaluations of community-based initiatives, qualitative research, behaviour change, mental health and wellbeing, loneliness and social isolation.
