Current Research

Current and recent projects include:

• Horizon Europe funded ICLEAR exploring a new intervention for those with advanced COPD with Prof Nancy Preston, led by colleagues from VUB in Belgium, and with a pan-European Consortia.
• Horizon Europe funded In-Touch exploring care for those with advanced dementia with Prof Nancy Preston and led from colleagues at University College Cork, with a pan-European consortia.
• The NIHR funded Palliative and End of Life Care Policy Research Unit with with Prof Nancy Preston and led by colleagues from King's College London and Hull/York Medical School.
• Developing a palliative care network across NWC England funded by NIHR with colleagues from Universities and clinical organisations across North West Coast.
• Exploring the experience of receiving immunotherapy for those with advanced cancer (NWCR) led by Prof Sarah Brearley
• CovPall: Understanding the response of specialist palliative care services to COVID-19 with Prof Nancy Preston and led by colleagues from King's College, London.
• mySUPPORT: implementing a comfort care booklet for people with dementia in nursing care homes (funded by Alzheimer's Society) with Prof Nancy Preston and led by colleagues from Queens University, Belfast.
• Two evaluations of enhanced community and seven day services across Greater Manchester (funded by Macmillan Cancer Care) led by Dr Sarah Brearley.
• ALTER: evaluating a novel end-of-life care service provided by Age UK (funded by Age UK) with Profs Nancy Preston and Sheila Payne.
• NAMASTE CARE TRIAL: investigating the feasibilty of conducting a trial of Namaste Care with people with advanced dementia in nursing care homes (funded by NIHR HTA) with Prof Katherine Froggatt (PI) and colleagues from Hertfordshire, Liverpool, Bristol.
• CHECC: investigating a new model of cottage hospice care with Hospice in the Weald. with Dr Sean Hughes (PI), Dr Mary Turner and Dr Helen Barnes.
• ELSA: End of Life Social Action Project; investigating the effectiveness of social action projects to influence people's quality of life (funded by the Cabinet Office) with Prof. Sheila Payne, Dr Nancy Preston, Dr Guillermo Perez Algorta, Dr Steve Dodd and Nick Ockenden and Matt Hill (Institute for Volunteering Research).
• PACT: A feasibility trial of a peer mentor intervention for those with advanced cancer with Dr Diane Roberts (University of Manchester) in collaboration with Linda Appleton (Clatterbridge Centre for Oncology), Dr Lynn Calman (Southampton University), Mr Paul Large (User representative), Prof Mari Lloyd-Williams (University of Liverpool), Prof Gunn Grande (University of Manchester), Prof Suzanne Skevington (University of Manchester).

• I also supervise a number of PhD students following a traditional route PhD and on the PhD in Palliative Care programme.

Research Interests

Providing excellent and appropriate care at the end of life is critically important not only to those with life-limiting illness, but also to informal and professional carers. This is a major issue, as it is estimated that around 63% of those who die will require palliative care at some stage during their illness. Research into all aspects of palliative care provision is vitally important, to provide appropriate evidence to support care decisions. Whilst there has been research in this field for a number of years now, there are still many unanswered questions as the evidence base remains small, possibly as a result of the poor funding in this area, and the need to develop research capacity. Within the International Observatory on End of Life Care we focus on a number of different areas of research which contribute to developing this evidence base: researching the needs of older people, symptom management, evaluating service models, and our overarching theme of developing research methods to investigate end of life care.

Current Teaching

I teach on our internationally recognised PhD in Palliative Care programme. You can see information here: https://www.lancaster.ac.uk/health-and-medicine/research/ioelc/. I am the admissions tutor for the programme, and am always happy for people to contact me to discuss the programme.

Additional Information

I am a Professor of Palliative Care and Co-Director of the International Observatory on End of Life Care, part of the Division of Health Research. I am also Editor in Chief of the journal ‘Palliative Medicine’. This is one of the premier journals in the field, and is an international multi-disciplinary journal. Palliative Medicine is the research journal of the European Association of Palliative Care. I am a fellow of the Queens Nursing Institute.

PhD Supervision Interests

I am interested in supervising students in the areas of palliative and supportive care, with a particular interest in primary care, models of palliative care provision, care homes and volunteers. I am happy to support applications for externally funded fellowships.