Professor Justine Davies

Professor Justine Davies

Institute of Applied Health Research
Professor of Global Health Research

Contact details

Telephone
+44 (0) 7384 584673
Email
j.davies.6@bham.ac.uk
Twitter
@drjackoids
View my research portal
Address
Murray Learning Centre
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Professor Justine Davies' aim is to do research that informs development of health systems that deliver quality care in lower- or middle-income countries. All of her research aims to answer a policy relevant question and she often works with policy makers, including the WHO, to develop and answer questions of relevance to them. 

Professor Davies is passionate about capacity building, fairness, and decolonialising global health. Where possible, she aims to use her knowledge and work to further these ends.

Research involves looking at the health of the population and the health system that serves them from many different angles; from epidemiological, qualitative, systems-readiness, and economic perspectives. Professor Davies also does implementation science research in order to study real-world solutions to identified gaps.

Specialty areas of interest are conditions that require surgery to treat, injuries, and cardiovascular diseases and their risk factors. All of these specialty areas require a joined-up health system that provides good quality care.

Professor Davies is the lead of the Institute for Global Innovation’s Ageing Frailty, and Resilience theme.

ORCID ID: 0000-0001-6834-1838

Qualifications

  • BSc 1st class hons (Zoology)
  • MD (research) Clinical pharmacology
  • Member of the Royal College of Physicians
  • Dip ABRSM (Violin, performance)
  • MBChB hons (Medicine)
  • BMSc 1st class hons (forensic medicine and medical law)

Biography

After training in medicine, Professor Justine Davies practised as a cardiovascular clinical pharmacologist, caring for people with cardiovascular diseases and their risk factors. As a part of this role, as a clinical lecturer, she ran early-stage clinical trials of medications to reduce cardiovascular risk. 

Recognising the increasing necessity to put human health in the context of the planet on which we live, Professor Davies took time out from clinical duties to study for a Zoology degree – including environmental and climate sciences. At that time, and driven by a love of writing and explaining science to lay people, she also worked as a freelance science journalist, including for the BBC.  

After this, she honed her interest in Global Health and research excellence whilst working at the Lancet Journals. Professor Davies was an executive editor at The Lancet before launching as Editor in Chief, The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology. Under her editorship the journal rose from start-up to the highest impact journal in its category.

A desire to contribute to answering important global health problems instigated her return to academia in 2016/2017 after completing the Lancet Commission on Global Surgery and The Lancet Diabetes & Endocrinology Commission on Diabetes in sub-Saharan Africa.

Professor Davies has since worked at Wits University in South Africa and KCL in the UK. She now has honorary professorships at Wits and Stellenbosch Universities in South Africa.  

Experience at The Lancet Journals has developed her keen sense of what is an impactful research question and how to answer this with methodological rigour. It has also embedded within her a sense of fairness and desire for more equity in the worlds of health policy, research, and learning.

Teaching

Professor Davies teaches on the Global Health modules of the MPH program at University of Birmingham and also mentors students and junior staff in the institutes where she has honorary positions and projects.

Postgraduate supervision

Professor Davies supervises PhD students in the fields of global health systems and subjects related to surgery, injuries, or cardiovascular diseases.

Research

Research interests

Professor Justine Davies is interested in health systems to provide quality care in low- or middle-income countries.

Specialty areas of interest are cardiovascular diseases, surgery, and injuries.

Current projects

  • NIHR Global Health Research Unit on Global Surgery: Establishing a Sustainable Network of Surgical Research.  Co-Investigator and co-lead of the access to care workstream 
  • US NIH PAR-19-376: Mobile Health: Technology and Outcomes in Low and Middle Income Countries. 1R21TW011636-01A1. Rwanda 912: an mHealth Application to Improve Quality of Trauma and Emergency Care in Kigali, Rwanda. Co-Investigator
  • Utstein 2: Development of guidelines for collection of Global Surgery Metrics (funded by the Laerdal Foundation) co-lead
  • MRC: Systems thinking approach to developing an integrated and patient-centred intervention model for multimorbidity. Co-investigator
  • NIHR Health Policy and Systems. Perioperative health systems to support surgical treatment: Establishing a world leading global health research collaboration to deliver innovative solutions promoting the safety and quality of care for surgical patients. Co-investigator
  • Academy of Medical Sciences/GCRF Network grant: AfroSurg: A Network to Improve Equitable Access to Safe and Timely Surgical Care in Southern Africa. Co-lead.
  • NIHR Health Policy and Systems. Equitable access to quality trauma systems in Lower- and Middle-Income Countries. Assessing gaps and developing priorities. Equitrauma, Principle Investigator

  • Global Health and Population Project on Access to Care for Cardiometabolic Diseases (HPACC)

Other activities

Professor Davies regularly reviews for medical journals and funding bodies. She has sat as a panel member for NIH funding.

Professor Davies is a member of the WHO team to agree targets for the Global Diabetes Compact.

Selected journalist articles written by Professor Justine Davies:

'More harm than good' - The Guardian

'There are risks as well as benefits – so get the facts, then decide' - The Scotsman

'Diabetes targets would cost more but the impact would be worth it: here’s how' - The Conversation

'Bracelets from cluster bombs' - The Lancet

'Why it’s so difficult to tackle diabetes in sub-Saharan Africa' - The Conversation 

'Climate complexities stoke disease controversies' - SciDev.Net

'Cost of diabetes care in Africa could triple by 2030' - SciDev.Net

'Modified plant clears up deadly water toxin' - SciDev.Net

Publications

Recent publications

Article

Whitaker, J, Amoah , AS, Dube , A, Chirwa , L, Munthali , B, Rickard, RF, Leather , AJM & Davies, J 2023, 'A novel application of multi facility process map analysis for rapid injury care health system assessment in Northern Malawi', BMJ open. <https://bmjopen.bmj.com/>

Global Health and Population Project on Access to Care for Cardiometabolic Diseases 2023, 'Improving health outcomes of people with diabetes: target setting for the WHO Global Diabetes Compact', The Lancet. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(23)00001-6

Owolabi, EO, Ferreira, K, Nyamathe , S, Ignatowicz, A, Odland, ML, Abdul-Latif, A-M, Byiringiro, JC, Davies, J & Chu, KM 2023, 'Social determinants of seeking and reaching injury care in South Africa: a community-based qualitative study', Annals of Global Health, vol. 89, no. 1, 5. https://doi.org/10.5334/aogh.4003

Whitaker, J, Brunelli, G, Van Boeckel, TP, Dube , A, Amoah , AS, Rickard, RF, Leather, AJM & Davies, J 2022, 'Access to care following injury in Northern Malawi, a comparison of travel time estimates between Geographic Information System and community household reports', Injury, vol. 53, no. 5, pp. 1690-1698. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.injury.2022.02.010

WARE, LJ, Maposa , I, KOLKENBECK-RUH, A, Norris, SA, SOEPNEL, L, Crouch , SH, Kagura, J, NAIDOO, S, SMITH, W & Davies, J 2022, 'Are cardiovascular health measures heritable across three generations of families in Soweto, South Africa? A cross-sectional analysis using the random family method', BMJ open, vol. 12, no. 9, e059910. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2021-059910

Mattila , P, Davies, J, Mabetha , D, Tollman, SM & D’Ambruoso , L 2022, 'Burden of mortality linked to community-nominated priorities in rural South Africa', Global Health Action, vol. 15, no. 1, 2013599. https://doi.org/10.1080/16549716.2021.2013599

Odland, ML, Gassama, K, Bockarie, T, Wurie, H, Ansumana, R, Witham, MD, Oyebode, O, Hirschhorn, LR & Davies, J 2022, 'Cardiovascular disease risk profile and management among people 40 years of age and above in Bo, Sierra Leone: a cross-sectional study', PLOS One, vol. 17, no. 9, e0274242. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0274242

King, C, Shaha, SK, Morrison, J, Ahmed, N, Kuddus, A, Pires, M, Nahar, T, Hossin, R, Haghparast-Bidgoli, H, Khan, AKA, Davies, J, Azad, K & Fottrell, E 2022, 'Changes in non-communicable diseases, diet and exercise in a rural Bangladesh setting before and after the first wave of COVID-19', PLOS Global Public Health, vol. 2022. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pgph.0001110

Manne-Goehler, J, Theilmann, M, Flood, D, Marcus , M-E, Andall-Brereton, G, Agoudavi, K, Lopez Arboleda , WA, Aryal, KK, Bicaba, BW, Bovet, P, Brant, LCC, Brian, G, Chamberlin, G, Chen, G, Damasceno , A, Dorobantu, M, Dunn, M, Ebert, C, Farzadfar, F, Singh Gurung, M, Guwatudde, D, Houehanou, C, Houinato, D, Hwalla , NC, Jorgensen, JMA, Karki, KB, Labadarios, D, Lunet, N, Carvalho Malta, D, Martins, JS, Mayige, MT, Wong-McClure, R, Moghaddam, SS, Mwangi, JK, Mwalim, O, Norov, B, Quesnel-Crooks, S, Rohde, S, Seiglie , JA, Sibai , AM, Silver, BK, Sturua, L, Stokes, A, Supiyev , A, Tsabedze, L, Zhumadilov, Z, Jaacks, LM, Atun, R, Davies, J, Geldsetzer, P, Vollmer, S & Bärnighausen, TW 2022, 'Data resource profile: the Global Health and Population Project on Access to Care for Cardiometabolic Diseases (HPACC)', International Journal of Epidemiology. https://doi.org/10.1093/ije/dyac125

Collaboration for Research Implementation, Training in Critical Care, Asia Africa ‘CCAA’ 2022, 'Development of a quality indicator set to measure and improve quality of ICU care in low- and middle-Income countries', Intensive Care Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00134-022-06818-7

NIHR Global Health Research Unit on Global Surgery, COVIDSurg Collaborative, Glasbey, J, Bhangu, A & Nankivell, P 2022, 'Elective surgery system strengthening: development, measurement, and validation of the surgical preparedness index across 1632 hospitals in 119 countries', The Lancet, vol. 400, no. 10363, pp. 1607-1617. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(22)01846-3

Odland, ML, Abdul-Latif, A-M, Ignatowicz, A, Alyande, B, Ofori, BA, Balanikas, E, Bekele, A, Belli, T, Chu, KM, Ferreira, K, Howard, A, Nzasabimana , P, Owolabi, EO, Nyamathe , S, Kunfah, SMP, Tabriri, S, Yakubu, M, Whitaker, J, Byiringiro, JC, Davies, J & The EquiTrauma Collaborative 2022, 'Equitable access to quality trauma systems in Low- and Middle Income Countries: assessing gaps and developing priorities in Ghana, Rwanda and South Africa', BMJ Global Health, vol. 7, no. 4, e008256. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmjgh-2021-008256

NIHR Global Surgery collaboration 2022, 'Global economic burden of unmet surgical need for appendicitis', British Journal of Surgery, vol. 109, no. 10, pp. 995-1003. https://doi.org/10.1093/bjs/znac195

Seward, N, Hanlon, C, Abdella, A, Abrahams, Z, Alem, A, Araya, R, Bachmann, M, Bekele, A, Bogale, B, Brima, N, Chibanda, D, Curran, R, Davies, J, Beyene, A, Fairall, L, Farrant, L, Frissa, S, Gallagher, J, Gao, W, Gwyther, L, Harding, R, Kartha, MR, Leather, A, Lund, C, Marx, M, Nkhoma, K, Murdoch, J, Petersen, I, Petrus, R, van Rensburg, A, Sandall, J, Sevdalis, N, Sheenan, A, Tadesse, A, Thornicroft, G, Verhey, R, Willott, C & Prince, M 2022, 'HeAlth System StrEngThening in four sub-Saharan African countries (ASSET) to achieve high-quality, evidence-informed surgical, maternal and newborn, and primary care: protocol for pre-implementation phase studies', Global Health Action, vol. 15, no. 1, 1987044. https://doi.org/10.1080/16549716.2021.1987044

Comment/debate

Bekele, A, Chu, K, D’Ambruoso , L, Davies, J, Ferriolli, E, Greig, C, Manaseki-Holland, S, Regnier, D & Siddiqi, S 2022, 'Global health research funding applications – brain drain under another name?', Lancet Global Health, vol. 10, no. 1, pp. e22-e23. https://doi.org/10.1016/S2214-109X(21)00505-2

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