PhD Scholars

Ellen is a PhD student with the HRB-TMRN based at the HRB Clinical Research Facility University College Cork. Ellen holds a first-class honour bachelor’s degree in Public Health from University College Cork. From 2020 to 2021 Ellen worked as a research assistant for the TRAMS (trials research and methodologies unit) in the HRB Clinical Research Facility Cork and has been involved in various research projects.

Ellen’s doctoral research is focused on the planning and communication of retention in clinical trials. Her research consists of four pieces of work; investigating the cost of retention strategies, how retention is planned and communicated in clinical trial protocols, how retention is communicated in patient information leaflets and conducting interviews with trial team staff and trial participants to get a more in-depth understanding of the planning processes and communication of retention strategies in clinical trials. The overall project aims to investigating how retention is planned and communicated during the lifecycle of a clinical trial.

Ellen is also involved in other trial methods projects and is on the leadership team for the TMRP Trial Conduct Retention Working Group as of 2024.

She is supervised by Dr Frances Shiely (Senior Lecturer and Director of Education, HRB Clinical Research Facility, University College Cork) and Professor Katie Gillies (Director, Health Care Assessment Programme, Health Service Research Unit, University of Aberdeen).

Simone has first class honours degrees in the following: a BSc in biology from the University of South Florida an MSc in biology from Texas A&M University, a BSN from Columbia University in New York and a higher diploma in Midwifery from the National University of Ireland, Galway. She was also an Evidence Synthesis Ireland fellow for a Cochrane Systematic Review update. Simone has clinical experience in high dependency neurology nursing, and intensive care nursing. As a midwife she has practiced in early pregnancy and gynecology and the labour ward. Her research interests include improving clinical trial methodology and its implementation in health care. Simone’s project, The Kid’s Trial, will focus on teaching the power of clinical trials and their methodology by co-creating a trial with children and their parents.

Kathleen is a PhD student with the HRB-TMRN and based in the School of Nursing and Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin. Kathleen obtained her Bachelor of Arts degree in Visual Culture from the National College of Art and Design in 2016 and a Master of Social Science degree in Cultural Sociology from University College Dublin in 2017. Kathleen has worked as a Research Assistant for several years in TCD’s School of Nursing and Midwifery, focusing on maternal health and maternal health services. Her doctoral research is interested in supporting Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) activities in maternal and neonatal clinical trials.

She is supervised by Professor Valerie Smith (Full Professor of Midwifery, University College Dublin) and Professor Déirdre Daly (Associate Professor in Midwifery, Trinity College Dublin) and supported by External Advisory Committee members Dr Linda Biesty (Senior Lecturer, University of Galway) and Professor Katie Gillies (Professor, University of Aberdeen).

ORCID ID: 0000-0001-8125-2960

Parastoo Niloofar graduated from Tehran University of Medical Sciences with an MSc in Biostatistics and also hold BSc in Statistics from the University of Tehran. Her MSc project was about detecting the diagnostic accuracy of different tests without a gold standard. Shortly after graduation, she started working as a Biostatician in different institutes, mainly for North Khorasan University of Medical Science where has been working for the last four years. Her research interest areas include longitudinal data analysis, diagnostic accuracy assessment, Bayesian inference and statistical neuro science. Parastoo will work with Prof John Newell, University of Galway on “Translation statistics in clinical trials”.

Johanna is a PhD student with HRB-TMRN and Evidence Synthesis Ireland, based in the School of Nursing and Midwifery at the University of Galway. Prior to coming to Galway, Johanna obtained a first-class Master of Public Health in University College Cork, and served as a research assistant in the School of Public Health, including under a COVID-19 Emergency Evidence Response Service summer scholarship. Johanna’s clinical and research experiences have focused on public use of health information; currently, her work explores vulnerability to misinformation in the Irish setting.

Emer is a Health Research Board funded PhD scholar with UCD Clinical Research Centre. Emer completed Graduate Medicine UCD in 2017 and an MSc in Clinical and Translational Research in 2019. She worked as a Research Associate with Children’s Health Ireland receiving the award for Research Paper of the year 2022 for her latest publication “An Estimate of the Cumulative Paediatric Prevalence of Rare Diseases in Ireland and Comment on the Literature”. Emer is studying under the supervision of Prof Peter Doran (University of Galway School of Medicine) and Prof Michael Keane (UCD School of Medicine), her project is on the use of Digital Technologies in Clinical Trials.

Sindhu Augustine is a Registered Nurse with the Nursing and Midwifery Board of Ireland. She is currently working as Research and Clinical Trials Nurse at CHI@Crumlin. Sindhu holds MSc in Clinical Practice, a Graduate Diploma in Children’s Cancer Nursing and Graduate Certificate in Clinical Trials from UCD. Sindhu is studying under the supervision of Dr Patricia Fox and Prof Eilish McAuliffe (UCD School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Systems) and with the guidance of Dr Cormac Owens (CHI@Crumlin). Her current research has focused on Childhood Cancer Clinical Trials to explore parents’ perceptions and attitudes towards clinical trials.

Mengqi is a PhD student with the HRB-TMRN and Irish Cancer Society based at the University of Galway. Mengqi is currently working as a researcher of the Irish Cancer Society funded programme ‘Informed Health Choices-Cancer (IHC-Cancer)’. The programme aims to provide people impacted by cancer with the knowledge and skills necessary to think critically about the reliability of health information and claims and make well-informed choices. Mengqi has a background in research on nutrition-related issues of the elderly, such as anorexia of ageing. She is supervised by Prof. Declan Devane and Dr Marie Tierney.

Kara Mc Loughlin graduated with a BSc (Hons) in Occupational Therapy from Teesside University in 2012. She worked in the UK & New Zealand before returning to Ireland in 2016. She has taken an active role in prompting Occupational Therapy in Ireland and sat on the management team for the Association of Occupational Therapy.

Both academically and clinically Kara has had an active role in the emerging area of Geriatric Emergency Medicine. She completed her MSc in Older Persons Rehabilitation at University College Cork and completing research exploring Emergency Medics understanding and management of frailty. She was also involved in the setting up of a number of Frail Intervention Therapy Teams through Ireland before commencing her current post as research fellow/PhD candidate in the University of Limerick in May 2023.

Her current post is the principal investigator on the CREAT-ED – Development of Core Outcome Set for Older Adults in the Emergency Department project.

T he primary aim of this study is to develop an evidence and consensus-based Core Outcome Set (COS) for research studies with older adults in the Emergency Department (ED). It will involves a large steering group of international specialise in the area of older adults in the ED as and Patient and pubic (PPI) involvement. This project will run from 2023-2027.

Marci Kay Livingston, DNP, MPH, RN, CHPN (she/her) is a HRB-TMRN PhD Scholar at the University of Limerick.  As a Registered Nurse in the United States, Marci Kay specialized in hospice, palliative care, and clinical research.  She is a Certified Hospice and Palliative Nurse and a Certified Mobile Research Nurse.  She previously worked as the Director of Patient Care Services at both for- and non-profit hospice organizations in California.  With a passion for meeting people where they are, she enjoys engaging with patients, clinicians, and stakeholders.

With a BSc in Nursing from Louisiana State University – Health Sciences Center; a MPH from the University of Edinburgh, and a Doctor of Nursing Practice from California State University – Fresno, Marci Kay has focused her academic journey on understanding how individuals and groups define concepts such as well-being, health, and comfort. Her topic within the HRB-TMRN program will center on exploring the participation of people with lived experience of a condition/intervention in the development of Core Outcome Sets.  She is supervised by Dr Katie Robinson and Dr Elaine Toomey.

Katarina Medved is a SPHeRE (and HRB-TMRN) scholar based at School of Public Health, University College Cork. She holds first class honours bachelor’s degree in Pharmaceutical Science with Drug Development from IT Sligo and Postgraduate Diploma in Clinical Trials from University College Cork.

In 2022, Katarina started a Clinical Trial Data Manager role at Cancer Trials Group, University College Cork. In this position, she worked on LYSA and LIAM Mc randomised clinical trials, writing and reviewing study documentation, and ensuring the accuracy and integrity of trial data. She also managed the Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) panels.

Currently, Katarina is working as an Interactive Response Technology Analyst at Eli Lilly, Cork.

Katarina’s doctoral research is focused on engagement and retention of Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) contributors in cancer clinical trials. The research consists of four studies: scoping review of literature to identify key factors, and methods influencing PPI engagement and retention in cancer clinical trial PPI activities, a survey conducted across Ireland and the UK to gather demographic data on PPI contributors and assess disparities in their participation, Qualitative Interviews with PPI contributors to explore their experiences, perspectives, and the dynamics that affect their engagement in cancer clinical trials PPI activities and Focus Group Discussions with PPI contributors and researchers to identify training needs and preferences for improving PPI engagement.

Katarina is supervised by Dr Frances Shiely (Senior Lecturer and Director of Education, HRB Clinical Research Facility, University College Cork), Professor Patricia Kearney (School of Public Health, University College Cork), Dr Laia Raigal (Cancer Research @UCC at University College Cork) and Dr Alice Biggane (Pfizer, UK)

Amelia Phillips is a SPHeRE scholar based in the College of Nursing, Medicine, and Health Sciences at the University of Galway. She holds BA (hons) in Psychology from the South East Technological University, as well as a first-class honours MSc in Health Psychology from the University of Galway.

Since graduating from her MSc in 2023, she has worked as a research assistant at the University of Galway on multiple projects, most recently on the Exploring Consultation Exercises in Scoping Reviews (CESR) project. This position saw her working with experts in evidence synthesis, spearheading the recruitment process, taking a lead on data collection and analysis, as well as writing the final research paper.

In her doctoral studies, Amelia will investigate the use of behavioural science to improve recruitment and retention of health policymakers in trials of knowledge translation (KT) interventions. Her work aims to inform the conduct of trial evaluations of knowledge translation (KT) interventions that aim to facilitate the use of evidence by policymakers in public-health decision-making. Specifically, she will explore how public health policymakers (and their organisations) can be recruited to, and retained as participants of, trials of KT interventions.

Amelia is supervised by Professor Elaine Toomey (Centre for Health Research Methodology in the School of Nursing/Midwifery in the University of Galway), Professor Molly Byrne (School of Psychology, University of Galway), and Professor Shaun Treweek (Health Services Research Unit, University of Aberdeen).

Nirdesh has an MSc. Statistics degree from University College Dublin (UCD) and a Post Graduate Diploma in Applied Statistics from Indira Gandhi National Open University (IGNOU), India. He is also a former student member of the Institute & Faculty of Actuaries (IFoA), UK; and the Institute of Actuaries of India (IAI). Professionally, Nirdesh has worked in roles including Statistical Consultant, Analytics Consultant, Data Scientist, and Data Analyst.
Whilst at UCD, Nirdesh undertook a mini research project in collaboration with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The project focused on improving statistical inference at the upper tails of Radon measurements data from Irish homes. Ireland, owing to its unique geology is vulnerable to abnormally high radon concentrations. This presents a unique problem as the lognormal model which is traditionally used to model Radon measurements is inappropriate in the Irish context. The research focussed on developing mixed models based on a comparative pdf approach to improve statistical inference at the upper tails.
At present, Nirdesh is in year – 1 of his PhD in Biostatistics at the University of Galway (UoG) under Dr. Neil O’Leary’s supervision. The focus of his PhD is “Improving Inference in Clinical Trials with Missing Data with a focus on Clustered Randomised Trials”. His research interest lies in Applied Statistics with a focus on developing imputation methods that can be tailored to different trial designs.