My role combines teaching and research activities. I completed my Ph.D. at the University of Dundee in 2013. Over the past 15 years, I have gained extensive research experience through my work as a researcher on different projects focussing on the improvement of the delivery of patient care in both the acute and palliative care setting. I have an invested interest in supporting patients with cancer and their families through innovative nurse-led research that endeavours to develop and implement interventions targeting psycho-educational aspects of care in order to facilitate living with and beyond illness. 

I am the Module Co-ordinator for two modules (Systemic Anticancer Treatment Adninstration, Essentials of Cancer Care) and I also teach the module of Therapeutic Communication, all part of the BSc Professional Health Studies Programme. I work in collaboration with the Beatson Cancer Centre and local Health Boards.

• Cancer nursing
• Haematological oncology
• Systematic review methods, Qualitative meta-syntheses
• Communication
• Sexuality in the context of cancer care
• Meaning making 
• Patient education
• Symptom management
• Evidence-based care
• Patient Reported Outcome Measures

I have experience on eHealth intervention studies. As part of my role, I was  involved in the training and recruitment of patients; communication and close collaboration with health care professionals in the participating sites; co-ordination of data collection through use of quantitative and qualitative methods; support of junior research staff; and report and publication writing. I was also a core member of a multi-centre prospective RCT funded by the European Union (FP7). I initiated, facilitated and co-ordinated dialogue between partner countries on a number of research design and methodology matters, while at the same time I led a systematic review on clinical guidelines for the management of chemotherapy-related symptoms and self-care and self-management advice conducted as part of the project, where I had the opportunity to work collaboratively with partners with different clinical, professional and even cultural backgrounds. I was heavily involved in the technological implementation of the system through working closely with the company partner bringing together my clinical and research expertise.

I have also worked in the palliative care setting on the implementation of the Dignity Care Inventory in the community, a patient centred intervention focussing on addressing dignity related needs of patients nearing end of life. I was also involved in a feasibility project exploring the early access to palliative services for patients with lung cancer, where I had a substantive contribution to the project’s final output through systematic data collection, effective data analysis and critical interpretation of findings.

I have lead the conduction of a systematic review looking at nurses attittudes on sexual health provision in patients with cancer. This work was reulted in the production of an International Competencies Framework for educating nurses who work with paptiens with cancer. Currently we are exploring next steps for implementation testing of the proposed framework.

I was the Principal Investigator fro the Frailty Matters project (funded by the Burdett Trust for Nursing). This 3-phase project focused on enhancing leadership skills of communnity nurses through an educational and coaching inervention to manage frailty in Ayrshire. Currently we are working on the next steps of implementation testing of the Frailty House, a holistic model on managing frailty.

I am currently working in a new area of research, patients with commorbid dementia and cancer in collaboration with the Alzheimer's Scotland Centre for Policy and Practice, through PhD supervision.

I am also working on developing a new mult-modal intervention to address cognitive difficulties in people with a diagnosis of cancer. 

I am exploring the impact of COVID in cancer services in Lanarkshire from the perspective of nurses. 

I am collaborating with a number of UK and internaltional partners to develop an educational course for nurses caring for patients with advanced renal cancer (RCC4 nurses) 

I have also led a pilot study to test the fit of a new mask solution (facegaiter) for improved wearer protectionin collaboration with tensARC.

I have a strong commitment in carrying out top-level research, whose primary goal is to directly impact on the care provided by meeting the expectations, priorities and needs of both care providers (i.e. health professionals) and care receivers (i.e. patients, families and informal carers). 

• Systematic reviews
• Qualitative meta-synthesis methods
• Quality of qualitative research
• Phenomenology, Interpretative Phenomenological analysis
• Thematic analysis
• Use of computer packages to assist analysis of qualitative datasets
• Experience in large longitudinal qualitative datasets
• In-depth interviewing
• Interested in the use of discourse analysis in exploring formation of meaning
• Participatory Action research
• Interested in exploring creative methodologies for data capturing and analysis
• Interested in integrating innovative technological solutions within the clinical settings
• Interested in exploring the impact of cancer treatment on cognitive function and ways to address it.
• Interested on building capabilities of communities to manage frailty.