Dr Shuqing Si
Clincal Reasearch Fellow
Contact:
Email address: s.si.1@bham.ac.uk
Team Member
Clinical Research Fellow
Biography
Shuqing is a Clinical Research Fellow working under the ‘Psychosis’ theme within the Mental Health Mission. Shuqing completed her Master’s at University College London in neuroimaging, followed by her PhD at King’s College London focusing on brain structural changes during the development of psychosis, during which she developed quantitative research methods in psychosis.
Shuqing has been supporting the development and implementation of PsyMetRiC- a cardiometabolic risk prediction model for young people with psychosis, as well as neuroimaging projects in the psychosis theme. She is passionate about using quantitative methods to bridge the gap between research and real-world clinical impact.
Dr Gauri Sathe
Clinical Research Fellow
School of Psychology
Contact:
Email address: gauri.sathe@nhs.net
Team Member
Clinical Research Fellow
Biography
I completed Medical graduation and post-graduation in pharmacology. I worked as a clinical research fellow in oncology and now works as a research fellow in mood disorders. I primarily work in Ketamine treatment in drug resistance depression.
My passion is understanding the impact that mental health conditions can have on a person’s overall health and wellbeing of the person . I am passionate about clinical research and medical education, helping to advance the field of psychiatry and improve treatments for mental illness.
Dr Benjamin Perry
Clinical Professor of Psychiatry
University of Birmingham
Consultant Psychiatrist
Birmingham Early Intervention Services
Contact:
Email address: b.i.perry@bham.ac.uk
Team Member
Clinical Professor of Psychiatry - University of Birmingham, Consultant Psychiatrist - Birmingham Early Intervention Services
Biography
Ben is Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Birmingham, and Consultant Psychiatrist in the Birmingham Early Intervention Services. Ben’s primary research interest is improving our understanding of, and ability to intervene in, the physical morbidity of major mental illnesses like schizophrenia and depression.
He has expertise in using cutting edge methods straddling observational and genetic epidemiology, risk prediction and the development of predictive algorithms, data science, and causal inference. Ben is also developing an interest in translating and expanding the observational research findings through applied and mixed methods research.
Ben’s interest in psychiatry began during his medical studies in East London. His experiences on clinical placements in particular widened his eyes to the poor physical health outcomes too often experienced by people with mental illness. After joining the academic clinical training program in Cardiff where he trained in psychiatric genetics, he moved to the University of Warwick as an NIHR Academic Clinical Fellow, training in epidemiology and biostatistics. Then, having been awarded a prestigious NIHR Doctoral Research Fellowship, Ben moved to University of Cambridge to undertake his PhD. He was subsequently appointed Clinical Lecturer in Psychiatry at University of Cambridge and completed his clinical training in Cambridgeshire before moving to University of Birmingham.
Dr Angharad de Cates
NIHR Academic Clinical Lecturer in Psychiatry
School of Psychology
Contact:
Email address: a.n.decates@bham.ac.uk
Team Member
NIHR Academic Clinical Lecturer in Psychiatry - School of Psychology
Biography
Dr de Cates is an NIHR Clinical Lecturer and Psychiatry Registrar currently at the Institute for Mental Health, University of Birmingham. Until February 2024, she was a Guarantors of Brain Postdoctoral Clinical Fellow at the University of Oxford. Her research interests focus on exploring cognition and mood as transdiagnostic and novel psychopharmacological targets in mental illness, including early psychosis. Recent projects include a body of work examining the role of specific serotonin receptor agonists in improving cognition.
Angharad qualified from the University of Oxford, and completed NIHR Academic Foundation and Academic Clinical Fellow posts at the University of Warwick. She then moved to Oxford to complete a Wellcome Trust funded DPhil (working on the first fMRI studies of medications that activate the 5HT4 receptor and how these might be useful for cognition), and subsequently a Guarantors of Brain Clinical Postdoctoral Fellowship.
She has been supervised by Catherine Harmer, Phil Cowen and Susannah Murphy (DoP, Oxford), Thomas Nichols and Anya Topiwala (BDI, Oxford), Matthew Broome and Rachel Upthegrove (Birmingham) and Scott Weich (Sheffield).
She is now completing her psychiatry residency in the West Midlands while continuing her research supported by the NIHR with a Clinical Lectureship.
Dr Siân Lowri Griffiths
Assistant Professor
School of Psychology
Contact:
Email address: s.l.griffiths@bham.ac.uk
Team Member
Assistant Professor - School of Psychology
Biography
Dr Lowri Griffiths (She/her) is an Assistant Professor at the Institute for Mental Health and co-lead for the Children and Young People’s Theme of the Mental Health Mission, Midlands Translational Centre. Dr Griffiths has attracted ~£11 million of research funding as PI, Deputy PI and Co-I from a number of external funders including UKRI / ESCR, NIHR PGfAR, NIHR HSDR and EU Horizon. Dr Griffiths has recently established her own research group: CARE –Collaborative Applied Research for Equity in Mental Health.
Dr Griffiths has over 15 years of applied clinical research experience within the area of youth mental health. She has overseen large clinical trials and observational studies in early psychosis, applying multi-modal methods. Dr Griffiths has recently established the CARE research group which includes a dynamic team of interdisciplinary researchers and experts by experience to apply research in a collaborative way to improve mental health care and outcomes for all young people. Dr Griffiths is passionate about understanding and addressing the social determinants of mental illness which contribute to mental health inequities for underserved groups, and is an advocate for co-production and empowering young people with lived experience to drive meaningful change.
Camilla Carr
Research Associate (CADRE, Mental Health Mission)
Contact:
Email address: c.a.f.carr@bham.ac.uk
Team Member
Research Associate (CADRE, Mental Health Mission)
Biography
Camilla is currently a Research Associate at the University of Birmingham, working on the Children and Adolescents Data Resource (CADRE) project under the supervision of Dr Siân Lowri Griffiths. She graduated with a BSc in Psychology and following this graduated with an MSc in Mental Health, both at the University of Birmingham. She has previously worked at the University as a Research Associate on several different projects, within the Institute for Mental Health (IMH) and School of Psychology. These had a particular focus on postpartum mental health, specifically postpartum psychosis, and sleep, as well as sleep in new parents.
Camilla is interested in both youth mental health and postpartum mental health, which developed following her MSc dissertation that investigated maternal postnatal depression and anxiety and risk for mental health disorders in adolescent offspring. This encouraged her to volunteer at The Barberry’s Mother and Baby Unit for several months, where she got to interact with mothers experiencing postpartum mental health disorders. She is also very passionate about improving mental health in young people, either through research, interventions or digital tools.
Melanie Lafanechere
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Contact:
Email address:
Team Member
Research Project Officer, mental Health Mission, University of Birmingham
Biography
I have a BSc in Psychology from Aston University and an MSc in Brain Imaging and Cognitive Neuroscience from the University of Birmingham. I have worked at the University of Birmingham since 2020, where I started as Research Associate investigating the effects of transcranial direct current stimulation on the motor areas of the cortex.
I then joined the Primed+ Lab as a Project Officer for Professor Upthegrove where I worked on the multi-site international project, PRESCIENT; investigating the longitudinal trajectories of Psychosis in clinically high-risk populations and then on the PIMS Trial which is double-blind randomised placebo trial that investigates an anti-inflammatory in First Episode Psychosis patients.
I then took a career break to travel for 7 months and returned to the lab to work on EPICare, which is a co-designed, evidence-based, stakeholder-informed framework for the build, implementation, and evaluation of a national integrated digital registry and clinical decision support system for Psychosis, that will be implemented at several NHS Mental Health Services, and eventually adopted by all NHS Mental Health Services in England.
Clement Chinaza Owuamalam
Senior Information Analyst
Applied Information
Digital Data Technology Service
Contact:
Email address: clement.owuamalam@nottshc.nhs.uk
Team Member
Senior Information Analyst - Applied Information - Digital Data Technology Service
Biography
Clement Chinaza Owuamalam holds a bachelor’s degree in computer engineering and a master’s degree in IT Security. He is an active member of the British Computer Society and the IEEE Computer Society. He is also a long-standing volunteer with Rotary International. At Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust, Clement is a Senior Information Analyst and leads the streamlining, data visualisation, and automation of ongoing NHS national returns. Similarly, he exudes extensive experience in the use of SQL/Data Analytics tools, including SSIS, SSRS, SSMS, Power BI, Power Query, DAX, VBA, and C#. Clement seeks to contribute his knowledge and skills towards the enhancement of healthcare, through high-quality research, innovation, automation, data visualisation, knowledge sharing, teamwork, data accuracy, secure data handling, and opportunities for professional development.
Mark Byrne
Assistant Research Psychologist
Birmingham Women’s and Children’s NHS Foundation Trust
Contact:
Email address: m.byrne5@nhs.net
Team Member
Birmingham Women's and Children's NHS Foundation Trust
Biography
I have a BSc in Psychology from the University of the West of Scotland, and a MSc in Neural and Behavioural Sciences from the University of Tübingen. I begin working alongside the IMH in 2023, when I started as a Research Assistant Psychologist for the Bipolar At Risk Trial, a multi-centre randomised control trial investigating the efficacy of a novel cognitive behavioural therapy intervention in comparison to treatment as usual in young adults at high risk of developing Bipolar Disorder, under the supervision of the study’s Principal Investigator, Professor Matthew Broome, and Co-Lead, Dr. Emma Černis. I then got a new position in June 2024 as a Clinical Studies Officer, under the Mental Health Mission. I’m currently working on the ADEPP study, which is a randomised controlled trial looking at the use of antidepressant for the prevention of depression following first episode psychosis, and the PIMS Trial which is double-blind randomised placebo trial that investigates an inflammation in First Episode Psychosis patients, and the effects an anti-inflammatory drug has on it.
Clara Lewis
Senior Research Data Scientist
Mental Health Mission Midlands Translational Centre
Contact:
Email address: c.p.lewis@bham.ac.uk
Team Member
Senior Research Data Scientist - Mental Health Mission Midlands Translational Centre
Biography
I have a BSc in Mathematics from University of Warwick (2015) and a GradCert in Statistics from University of Sheffield (2019). I embarked on my career as a secondary school mathematics teacher trainee, only to have been inspired by an online course on Big Data which led me to conclude that a career in data was for me. In 2016, I began working within the Children and Family Court Advisory and Support Service (Cafcass), initially as a Data Inputter and from 2017 as Analytics Officer. Here I gained a broad experience of data analysis, including coding for app and report development, in data science and also the production of research data. I then joined the Department for Education in 2021, after I was successful at a cross-government recruitment round, as a Senior Statistical Data Scientist, badged by the Government Statistical Service. Within this role I was able to develop my skillset further, developing more junior staff, automating processes and leading the agile development of data products. After 18 months in that role, I joined the University of Birmingham as a Senior Data Analyst in 2022, where I developed institutional guidelines for report development and led the development of institutional level reports and materials. I am an experienced user of R, Python, JavaScript, M language (PowerQuery) and Git and of reporting software, such as SSRS and Power BI. I was delighted to join the Mental Health Mission MTC in October 2024 in my role as Senior Research Data Scientist.