Professor Sabena Yasmin Jameel-Choudhury BMBS.BMedSci. DFSRH. MMedEd. FRCGP. PhD.

Professor Sabena Yasmin Jameel-Choudhury

Birmingham Medical School
Professor of Medical Professionalism (Education)
Academic Quality Lead (Professional Statutory Regulatory Body)
Equity, Diversity & Inclusion Lead (School of Medical Science)

Contact details

Email
s.y.jameel@bham.ac.uk
Twitter
@sabenaj
View my research portal
Address
Birmingham Medical School
College of Medicine and Health
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK
Dr Sabena Jameel | Founders' Awards 2025 | University of Birmingham

Dr Sabena Jameel is a Birmingham-based GP and Professor of Medical Professionalism at the University of Birmingham Medical School. Inspired by her late father, a dedicated GP, she combines clinical practice with a passion for humanistic innovation in medical education, underpinned by moral flourishing.

Her academic journey centres on professionalism, character education, and phronesis (practical wisdom); themes that shaped her doctoral thesis exploring embodied wisdom and professional virtues in physicians.

In 2025, she received the University of Birmingham’s Founders Award for Educational Advancement (Joseph Chamberlain Award). She has also been a finalist for the NHS Inspirational Leadership awards 2017 when she was an Associate Dean for GP Education - Health Education England. Professor Jameel is also finalist for the BIMA National Healthcare Educator of the year awards (2025).

Research Interests:

  • Medicine’s Broken Heart (Moderated Love in Medicine)
  • Laughter and Medicine (British Academy Conference Grant PI) 2024
  • (Ethics of) Money and Medicine
  • Phronesis, character, and professional virtues

Alongside her academic work, Dr Jameel remains an active inner-city GP in Birmingham, continuing to find joy in bearing witness to patients’ lives and being of assistance.

Qualifications

Professor in Medical Professionalism (Education) and General Practitioner

  • PhD – Enacted Phronesis in General Practitioners 2021 (University of Birmingham)
  • MMedEd University of Warwick 2009
  • FRCGP 2012
  • DFSRH 2001
  • BMBS University of Nottingham 1996
  • BMedSci University of Nottingham 1993

Awards

  • University of Birmingham Joseph Chamberlain award for Educational Advancement. Winner 2025
  • BIMA Healthcare Educator of the year. Finalist 2025
  • NHS West Midlands Leadership Academy Inspirational Leader Award. Finalist 2017

Teaching

  • MBChB - All years
  • UoB Masters degree courses (Education for Health Professionals/Liberal Arts and Natural Sciences Intercalation/Masters in Character Education)
  • Guest lectures UK (Oxford University, Imperial College London, Kings College London, Worshipful Society of Apothecaries)
  • Guest lectures USA (Kern National Network/Medical College of Wisconsin)

Educational Work and Scholarship

  • Medical Professionalism
  • Professional Virtues
  • Flourishing in medicine
  • Virtue ethics and values-based practice
  • Reflective practice, compassion, and wise decision-making
  • Communication, self-awareness, and personal development
  • Equity, diversity and inclusion
  • Medical Humanities and interdisciplinary education

Through initiatives like the Radial Holistic Professionalism curriculum and founding the Practical Wisdom Network, Professor Jameel aims to bring depth, integrity, and humanity into medical education.

Postgraduate supervision

Doctoral Level

  • Feb 2026. External Examiner for PhD by publication. University of Dundee. “Looking through the Hermeneutic Window: meaning making in General Practice”
  • Nov 2025 External Examiner for PhD for a student at Liverpool University Medical School. “Professionalism as effortful practice. A case study of Saudi Arabian and United Kingdom medical schools teaching of Professionalism”.
  • July 2024 External Examiner for PhD for a student at Kings College London (KCL) “Developing evidence-based guidelines for devising psychological interventions for fostering wisdom in adolescents and young adults, through integrating theoretical approaches and results of empirical investigations”
  • 2024 Second supervisor for UoB PhD on “A force for good or a hindrance to successful teamwork? An anthropological exploration of intra-professional medical tribalism”.

Masters Level

  • (2025) Strategies to reduce Differential Attainment between UK and International Medical Graduates in The Royal College of General Practitioners Simulated Consultation Assessment.
  • (2025) Simulation Education for Character development and Values Based Practice.
  • (2025) Physician Associate Burnout: A Cross-Sectional Study in the UK.

Intercalation Students

  • (2023) Medical Humanities BA Intercalation. Moral Reasoning among Medical Students at different levels of Professionalisation.
  • (2022) School of Liberal Arts BA Intercalation. Phronesis as an approach to Decision-Making in the Management of Medical Uncertainty.

Medical Students 

Personal Independence Projects on Laughter and Medicine/Money and Medicine/Love and Medicine.

Research

Research Interests

Professional Virtues/Values Based Medical Practice/ Practical Wisdom-Phronesis/Virtue Ethics/Medical Professionalism/ Professional Identity Formation/Medical Humanities/ Equity, Diversity and Inclusion.

Current Projects

  • 2025 Love and Medicine
  • 2024 Laughter and Medicine (British Academy Grant. PI)
  • 2023 The Asklepion Project (Collaborating Centre for Values Based Practice)

Other activities

  • Founding Trustee for the Della Fish Foundation for Medical Education (National)
  • Co-Founder of the Practical Wisdom Network (International)
  • Academic member of the Royal College of General Practitioners Ethics Committee (National)
  • Independent Advisor to West Midlands Police Professional Standards Group (Regional)
  • Advisory Board Member Wesleyan Financial (National)
  • GP Appraiser
  • Salaried General Practitioner (BSOL) since 2000

Publications

Jameel, S. (2025) ‘A Hermeneutic approach to Professionalism and the link with Practical Wisdom’ in Shah, R. Clarke, R (Eds). How to Find Meaning in Healthcare: The Use of Hermeneutics in Healthcare Practice and Education. Taylor & Francis.

Jameel, S.Y (2025). A Critical Interpretive Literature Review of Phronesis in Medicine, -The Journal of Medicine and Philosophy: A Forum for Bioethics and Philosophy of Medicine, Volume 50, Issue 2, April 2025, Pages 117–132, https://doi.org/10.1093/jmp/jhae045

Launer, J. and Jameel, S.Y. (2024). A call for education against hatred. The Lancet, 403(10445), pp.2684–2685. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(24)01255-8.

Feder, G. Khan. A, Jewell. D, Jameel, S. (2024). Responding to the war in Israel and Palestine. BJGP Feb.

Jameel, S. (2023). ‘The Doctor with the Golden Heart’ in Kalet, A. Campbell, B. Fletcher, K, Fritz, J. et al. (Eds). Character and Caring: Medical Education Finds Our Way Out of the Pandemic. Waukesha. WI. USA. Ten16 Press.

Jameel S. (2023). ‘Healing the Whole: How Phronesis and Asklepions can transform Health Professional Education’. Conversations that Matter in Higher Education – Should Universities care about virtue? P47-51. Commissioned magazine article for USA wide organisation Virtues and Vocations. Via University of Notre Dame. https://socialconcerns.nd.edu/virtues/magazine/healing-the-whole-how-phronesis-and-asklepions-can-transform-health-professional-education/

Jameel, S. Peterson, A. and Arthur, J. (2022). Ethics and the Good Doctor – Character in the Professional Domain. Routledge Focus, Oxon.

Jameel, SY. (2022). ‘The malady of medicine: Practical wisdom as the antidote’. ClinTeach. 2022; 19(S2): e13539. https://doi.org/10.1111/tct.13539

Raja, U. Jameel, S. (2021). ‘Chronic Pain and Islam: A consideration of the muslim patient’s journey as per Rothman and Coyle’s model of the Soul’. JBIMA. Vol 9(3). Dec 2021.

Jameel, S (2020). ‘Disrupting the Status Quo with Phronesis (Practical Wisdom)’. ClinTeacher’ 17 (Supp 1) Paper 229. Wiley &Sons. Sept 2020.

Raja, U. Jameel, S. (2020) ‘Covid-19: The Pandemic, the Muslim Physician and Authentic Reflection’. JBIMA Vol 5(2). Aug 2020

Jameel, S. (2015) ‘Special extended book review of – A Flourishing Practice? by Peter Toon’. Journal of Psychological Therapies in Primary Care. Vol 4 (1). 68-71.

View all publications in research portal

Media experience

Podcasts

Audio and video

2021 International Wisdom Summit - #1 - roundtable on Common Wisdom Model, Morality, and flash talks
Phronesis and Asklepion Healing - Sabena Jameel

Expertise