Dr Mark Monahan B.Comm, MSc, PhD

• PhD in Health Economics , University of Birmingham, 2024
• MSc in Health Economics, University of Galway, 2013
• BComm International Experience, University of Galway, 2012

After completing an MSc in Health Economics at the University of Galway, he joined the Health Economics Unit at the University of Birmingham in November 2013 on a six month Research Associate post. Mark has been part of the department ever since and has also worked as a Research Fellow before being appointed Lecturer in Health Economics in 2022.

Mark was previously affiliated with the National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) Global Health Research Unit on Global Surgery where he provided health economic input to the global surgery programme. Mark undertook a PhD alongside his job which examined the economic rationale of investing in interventions to reduce wound infection after surgery using primary and secondary research sources within an iterative economic modelling framework. His PhD supervisors were Professor Tracy Roberts, Professor Sue Jowett and Professor Tom Pinkney.

Mark is the Health Economics Advisor at the NIHR Research Support Service (RSS) Hub delivered by the University of Birmingham and Partners. In this role, he provides advice on the design of health economic components of research projects submitted for funding to national competitions.

Mark is a module co-lead for the Undergraduate Health Economics module delivered in partnership with Birmingham Business School. He has previously co-led the Modelling in Health Economics MSc module, and the MPH Health Economics module. Mark has supervised 30 MSc dissertations and been a Personal Academic tutor to 21 MSc students so far. He is co-supervising an NIHR pre-doctoral fellowship with Professor Sue Jowett. Mark is the Academic Integrity Officer for the MSc Health Economics and Health Policy and the MSc Health Economics and Econometrics programmes. He was awarded a HEFi horizon award for teaching in 2022 and is currently working towards a Postgraduate Certificate in Higher Education.

In 2018, Mark was invited to speak to an All-Party Parliamentary Group on Micronutrients and Health in the Palace of Westminster. The subject of the meeting was on ‘Healthcare Cost Savings from Food Supplements.’ Mark presented previous research, published in the Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology, on the potential cost savings of iodine supplementation to pregnant women.

Postgraduate

• Modelling for Health Economics (module code 22346);
• Introduction to Health Economics (module code 02957);
• Economic Evaluation in health care (module code 07860);
• Health Economics (module code 08157);
• Economic Models and Human Genomics (module code 27603);

Undergraduate

• Health Economics (module code 33158);

Mark is interested in supervising doctoral research related to the following topics:

• Model-based economic evaluations
• Aspects of economic evaluation in surgical diseases
• Health State Valuation for use in economic evaluations
• The economics of Task-shifting

Mark’s main research interests include economic evaluation in high blood pressure, surgery, and task-shifting, respectively. In terms of methodology, Mark is interested in decision models with capacity constraints and agent-based modelling.

Mark is currently supervising research fellows delivering the health economic components for the ROCkeTS study (NIHR HTA 13/13/01). In addition, he is supervising a research fellow on two projects in conjunction with the Birmingham Health Partners Rapid Evaluation Centre: (1) the cost-effectiveness of virtual surgical wards, and (2) the cost-effectiveness of an integrated health care and early years support clinic for children and young people living in deprivation. He will be providing health economic modelling oversight for the SEQUENCE DIGITAL (NIHR200856) and Epi-Safe studies (NIHR204156). He has previously supervised a Research Fellow undertaking a trial-based economic evaluation of the PRE-EMPT trial (NIHR HTA 11/114/01).

Mark is a co-applicant on the NIHR HTA funded project “Comparing the clinical and cost-effectiveness of COlesevelam for Bile Acid diarrhoea with colestyramine or Loperamide, including long Term follow-up (COBALT)” (NIHR160696). He has previously been a co-applicant on a NIHR Accelerator Award (NIHR156728) and a NIHR RfPB study (NIHR202011).

Mark’s first publication, assessing the costs and benefits of iodine supplementation tablets for UK pregnant women, garnered national and internal press coverage (e.g. The Times, New Scientist, BBC news). It is in the top 1% of all research output ever tracked by Altmetric (score of 143), an indicator of research impact.

Mark helped form the NIHR Health Economics Network for Global Health. The motivation for the Network is to share learning, discuss and explore common challenges with regard to methods required and strategies to address the challenges of conducting applied health economics evaluation in Global Health. Health Economists from thirteen NIHR global health groups and units are represented in the network. Mark was an organiser of the inaugural face to face meeting in Birmingham early 2020 and he coordinated a successful organisation of the second meeting (virtual) with academics in LSTHM in March 2021.

Mark helped form the NIHR Health Economics Network for Global Health. The motivation for the Network is to share learning, discuss and explore common challenges with regard to methods required and strategies to address the challenges of conducting applied health economics evaluation in Global Health. Health Economists from thirteen NIHR global health groups and units are represented in the network. Mark was an organiser of the inaugural face to face meeting in Birmingham early 2020 and he coordinated a successful organisation of the second meeting (virtual) with academics in LSTHM in March 2021.