Profile
I am an academic GP and qualitative primary care researcher with interests in medical overuse, risk communication, and the role of evidence and values in clinical care. My work focuses on the social meanings that patients and clinicians ascribe to medical interventions, drawing on a range of approaches from sociology, philosophy and public health.
In October 2025, I began the NIHR SPCR Primary Care Clinicians PhD fellowship, funded by the Wellcome Trust. Alongside my role at QMUL, I work one day a week as a GP in Islington.
My PhD aims to understand and improve how the limitations and risks of blood tests are discussed in primary care settings. Blood tests are useful, but they do not always improve patient care and in some cases can cause harm: for example, borderline test results may cause patients to worry or have unnecessary further tests. These issues are not always clearly explained to patients, who often feel unsure about why blood test are done and what their results mean. Through the PhD, I hope to engage with patients and clinicians to come up with new strategies to improve communication about blood tests.
As part of my PhD I will be using a range of qualitative approaches, including ethnography, video-reflexive ethnography and Forum Theatre.
Research
Research Interests:
- Medical sociology
- Primary care
- Overdiagnosis
- Blood tests
- Communication
- Ethnography
- Qualitative research
- Creative methods
- Evidence and values in medicine
- Risk and uncertainty
- Medical philosophy
Publications
- Knowledge, community and care: Digital biocitizenship in gestational diabetes.
- Epistemic risk and non-epistemic values in end-of-life care.
- Non-maleficence and the ethics of consent to screening.
- Experiences of stigma and discrimination among people experiencing homelessness: a cross-sectional pilot survey in South London, UK
- Preventing type 2 diabetes in women with gestational diabetes: three theoretical perspectives on behaviour change.