Email: portico-services@ucl.ac.uk
Help Desk: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/ras/portico/helpdesk
- Principal Clinical Tutor
- Clinical, Edu & Hlth Psychology
- Div of Psychology & Lang Sciences
- Faculty of Brain Sciences
I am an Associate Professor in Clinical Psychology with a funded research programme
focussing on the areas detailed in my research summary. I am an experienced supervisor of PhD, MSc and, particularly, Clinical Psychology Doctoral projects (DClinPsys) (18 DClinPsys supervised to completion as of
12/2018). I am director of the UCL ADAPT lab (https://www.adaptlab.net/).
I am also Clinical Director of the UCL Clinical Psychology Doctorate with overall
responsibility for the practice based learning elements of the largest training course for clinical psychologists
in the country. I am an HCPC registered
Clinical Psychologist and experienced clinician with 13 years of post-qualification
clinical practice working with people affected by dementia. I have developed
services, supervised numerous trainee, assistant and qualified clinical
psychologists in their clinical practice and edited a book on systemic
psychotherapy with older people. I hold an honorary position with Camden and
Islington NHS Foundation trust and am also a BABCP accredited cognitive
behavioural therapist and have a post graduate diploma in clinical
neuropsychology.
Anxiety and depression are common in dementia and associated with numerous adverse outcomes. Psychological therapies might help with this. My ongoing fellowship work examines how we might optimally adapt psychological therapies that we know to be effective in people without dementia, for a dementia population.
Peer support for people with rare dementias
The national dementia strategy recommended that all people affected by dementia should be offered structured peer support. However, there is very little work examining the utility of this in people with rare dementias. I am Co-UCL lead and work-stream lead on the ESRC-NIHR funded RDS-Impact programme grant led by Prof Seb Crutch examining the outcomes and process of peer support in this group. I will contribute to all programme areas, but my workstream will focus on developing novel online interventions to deliver multicomponent peer support for carers of people with Frontotemporal and other rare dementias.
Adapting dementia screening tools for people with hearing impairment
Hearing loss is a key risk factor for dementia and commonly confounds screening in clinical practice. There are currently no dementia screening tools validated for people with hearing impairment. I am co-leading a project with Prof Doris Bamiou and Dr Sergi Costafredaz to address this through adapting and validating existing dementia screening tools for people with hearing impairment.
Other research areas
I teach on a variety of modules in the UCL Doctorate in Clinical Psychology including sessions on general clinical skills training, cognitive behavioural therapy, systemic therapy, neuropsychology ageing and mental health and dementia. I jointly coordinate teaching related to older adults and systemic practice.
01-SEP-2018 | Clinical Director | Doctorate in Clinical Psychology | University College London, United Kingdom |
2010 | Postgraduate Diploma | University of Nottingham | |
2003 | Doctorate in Clinical Psychology | Royal Holloway | |
1998 | Bachelor of Science | University of Nottingham |