Yen-Fu received training in Pharmacy in Taiwan where he was originally from. He came to the UK for postgraduate training in Biopharmacy and Public Health, and subsequently completed a PhD at the University of Nottingham. His PhD looked at prescribing problems in primary care, and focused in particular on the prescribing of potentially hazardous or contraindicated drug combinations (drug-drug interaction or drug-disease interaction) in general practice.
He then joined the West Midlands Health Technology Assessment Collaboration (WMHTAC) as a Systematic Reviewer and subsequently a Senior Systematic Reviewer. He accumulated substantial experience in conducting and teaching systematic reviews and health technology assessments during the 8 years in WMHTAC and completed several health technology assessment (HTA) reports.
He is currently a Research Fellow in the research team led by Professor Richard Lilford. In addition to contributing to systematic reviews of a wide variety of topics, he is involved in research related quality improvement in health care and health technology assessment of medical devices.
RESEARCH THEMES
Systematic Review, Quality Improvement, Health Technology Assessment, Evidence Synthesis
RESEARCH ACTIVITY
Quality Improvement
Evaluation of effectiveness of quality improvement interventions; use of quality indicators as a quality improvement tool; measuring preventability of adverse events through case note review; handover between hospitals and community
Systematic review
Validity of indirect comparisons; systematic review of adverse events; the impact of publication bias on evidence synthesis
Health Technology Assessment
Health technology assessment of medical devices; use of indirect comparisons in health technology assessment
Ashfaq K, Yahaya I, Hyde C, Andronis L, Barton P, Bayliss S, Chen Y-F. Clinical and cost-effectiveness of stem cell transplant in the management of acute leukaemia: a systematic review. Health Technology Assessment. Health Technology Assessment 2010;14(54). Available at: http://www.hta.ac.uk/project/1789.asp
Chen Y-F, Jowett S, Barton P, Malottki K, Hyde C, Gibbs S, Pepke-Zaba J, Fry-Smith A, Roberts J, Moore D. Clinical and cost-effectiveness of epoprostenol, iloprost, bosentan, sitaxentan and sildenafil for the treatment of pulmonary arterial hypertension within their licensed indications: a systematic review and economic evaluation. Health Technology Assessment 2009;13(49). Available at: http://www.hta.ac.uk/project/1621.asp
Rodríguez-Cobo I, Chen Y-F, Olowokure B, Litchfield I. Clinical and economic assessment of different general population strategies of pertussis vaccine booster regarding number of doses and age of application for reducing whooping cough disease burden: a systematic review. Vaccine 2008;26(52):6768-6776.
Chen Y-F, Jobanputra P, Barton P, Bryan S, Fry-Smith A, Harris G, Taylor R. Cyclooxygenase-2 (COX-2) selective non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs - etodolac, meloxicam, celecoxib, rofecoxib, etoricoxib, valdecoxib and lumiracoxib - for osteoarthritis and rheumatoid arthritis: a systematic review and economic evaluation. Health Technology Assessment 2008;12(11).
Available at: http://www.hta.ac.uk/project/1383.asp
Chen Y-F, Jobanputra P, Barton P, Jowett S, Bryan S, Clark W, Fry-Smith A, Burls A. A systematic review of the effectiveness of adalimumab, etanercept and infliximab for the treatment of rheumatoid arthritis in adults and an economic evaluation of their cost-effectiveness. Health Technology Assessment 2006;10(42).
Available at: http://www.hta.ac.uk/project/1469.asp
Chen Y-F, Neil KE, Avery AJ, Dewey ME, Johnson C. Prescribing errors and other problems reported by community pharmacists. Therapeutics & Clinical Risk Management 2005,1(4): 333-342.
Chen Y-F, Avery AJ, Neil KE, Johnson C, Dewey ME, Stockley IH. Incidence and possible causes of prescribing potentially hazardous/contraindicated drug combinations in general practice. Drug Safety 2005,28(1): 67-80.
Avery AJ, Sheikh A, Hurwitz B, Smeaton L, Chen Y-F, Howard R, Cantrill J, Royal S. Safer medicines management in primary care. British Journal of General Practice 2002, 52(suppl):S17-S21.
Chen Y-F, Dewey ME, Avery AJ and the Analysis Group of the MRCCFA Study [The Medical Research Council Cognitive Function and Ageing Study (MRC CFAS)]. Self-reported medication use for older people in England and Wales. Journal of Clinical Pharmacy and Therapeutics 2001,26(2):129-140.