International Scientific Advisory Board

Professor Rona Campbell WITH PERMISSION Rona Campbell

Rona Campbell is Professor of Public Health Research, and leads the Centre for Public Health within Bristol Medical School's Department of Population Health Sciences at the University of Bristol.  She is a National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Senior Investigator and is the Bristol-based Director of the Development and Evaluation of Complex Interventions for Public Health Improvement group (DECIPHer) and the Bristol lead for the NIHR School for Public Health Research (SPHR) and Deputy Director of the national school. 

Rona leads programmes of research concerned with multiple risk behaviour in adolescence and health promotion in schools. She is currently involved in a number of randomised controlled trials and systematic reviews all seeking evidence for the best ways to improve the health and well-being of children and young people.

Rona has a strong interest in methodological research, in particular, how to use qualitative methods alongside quantitative approaches, and how to make better use of social and behavioural theory in public health research. 

Ms Martina Johnston-Gray Photo of Martina Johnston-Gray
 
Martina Johnston-Gray has worked in the third and public sector for 25 years, as a frontline social worker, manager, leader, tutor, facilitator, trainer, and volunteer. Threading through all the work is a passion for social justice, providing space for citizens and communities to reclaim the power that is rightfully theirs and in making sure that those people whose voices are easier to ignore are heard and recognised.

She has worked in most areas of Glasgow alongside communities to carry out change, including as part of a council Poverty Leadership Panel and then with North West Glasgow Voluntary Sector Network, working on a yearlong Participatory Budgeting Pilot, working with citizens to design and deliver a Participatory Budgeting process.

She worked for ten years in Homelessness in many different roles including training, managing advocacy and mentoring programmes, supporting hostel closure, and managing a long running multi- agency Tenancy Sustainment learning project. She currently works as the manager of North West Glasgow Voluntary Sector Network, supporting the work of third sector organisations and providing support, advocacy, training, representation, and latterly an IT recycling project. She is keen to ensure that the voices of the organisations are heard, and they share equal power with those statutory sectors they work with.
 
More recently she has been working with the School of Health & Wellbeing on public patient involvement, making sure patients are actively involved in the design and development of new treatments and interventions.

She is also an active volunteer, has been a literacy tutor and worked with asylum seekers and refugees teaching English, volunteered to run a library in her son's nursery, is current vice chair of her son's school Parent Council, and sits on the board of a local, urban nature reserve - Hamiltonhill Claypits Nature Reserve. She has won awards for her volunteering and charity work including Active Parent of the Year from Parent Network Scotland and Woman in Charity from BWC.

Her passion is the citizens of Glasgow and beyond; to serve them, to have the honour to work alongside them, and to fight for the rights of those are not yet able to fight for themselves.

Prof Dorairaj Prabhakaran asian male wearing glasses

Professor Dorairaj Prabhakaran, educated at Bangalore Medical College (MBBS), the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (MD: Internal Medicine and DM: Cardiology) and McMaster University Canada MSc: Health Research Methodology), is an eminent cardiologist, epidemiologist and academician of global repute. He moved beyond the conventional world of clinical cardiology to advance science in the prevention of heart diseases and diabetes in India so that his work could benefit millions of people in this country.

He established large population cohorts in India which have provided major insights in diverse domains, ranging from epidemiology, biomarkers, role of nutrition, on heart diseases and diabetes. Evaluation of task shifting and mobile‐phone based solutions for providing personalized patient management solutions, and Yoga-care in cardiac rehabilitation (both of which were selected for the prestigious late breaking presentation at the American Heart Association meeting in 2018), are two best exemplars of low cost, context specific solutions to enhance quality of therapeutic and preventive care for chronic diseases in India. A low cost worksite wellness program designed by his team with this philosophy was applauded by the 2008 World Economic Forum report, as one of the best worksite programs.

Prof Prabhakaran’s contribution to capacity building in chronic disease health research and training is exemplary. He was the founding Director of the Centre of Excellence in Cardia‐metabolic Risk Reduction in South Asia, one of the 11 centres worldwide supported under the Global Health Initiative of National Institutes of Health (NIH) of USA. This centre has now transformed into an international partnership namely ‘Centre for Control of Chronic Conditions (CCCC)’ between four world‐class institutions: the All India Institute of Medical Sciences, Emory University, LSHTM and PHFI. He is an exceptional mentor of doctoral, post‐doctoral and physician scientists nationally and internationally, many of whom have become leaders in heart disease research. Prof. Prabhakaran has by far, more than 500 publications in scientific journals such as the New England Journal of Medicine, The Lancet, Circulation, British Medical Journal, Nature, JAMA, etc. and has an H‐Index of 83. He was the lead editor of a major two volume text book of Cardiology which has been well received. He has been listed as the topmost researcher in Medicine in India terms of publications for the years 2009-2014 by Scopus and Department of Science & Technology, Government of India.

Prof Prabhakaran’s work has had large impact on science, health care and policy. Under his editorial leadership The World Bank published Cardiovascular Disease volume of the latest Disease Control Priorities Project. This volume estimates cost effectiveness of available interventions and provides a summary to policy makers across the world to prioritize their investments.

His exceptional contributions spanning Science, Medicine and Public Health has catapulted the field of Preventive Cardiology in India and in the developing world.