(NIHR) Implementation of the Diabetes Severity SCOre (DISSCO) and cardiovascular severity scores in general practice electronic health records

Diabetes and coronary heart disease (CHD) are among the most common long term conditions managed in primary care. This proposed PhD programme aims to build on findings from our recent SPCR-funded work developing measures to assess the severity of type 2 diabetes and CHD using data routinely-collected during GP visits in England. We plan to develop these measures as automated tool to estimate disease severity, and test its implementation and clinical utility in primary care systems.

The PhD programme aims to:

i) conduct qualitative studies identifying patients', carers', and general practitioners' perceptions on contributors and drivers of disease severity;

ii) externally validate the developed severity measures in a separate database;

iii) design and implement a diabetes-specific and heart disease-specific severity measures in GP systems to enable general practitioners to stratify patients by their disease severity and assess its association with future clinical outcomes, mainly hospital admissions and morality. Risk stratification is increasingly important to identify increased clinical input required whilst still delivering care closer to home and outside secondary care settings.  

Entry Requirements

Applicants should have obtained at least an Upper Second class honours degree (or equivalent) in statistics, or a degree with a strong quantitative component.

A master's degree with relevant training in research methods is desirable but not essential; equivalent research experience will be considered.

Applicants interested in this project may wish to contact the Primary Supervisor to discuss any specific details of the project.

How To Apply

To be considered for this Studentship you MUST submit a formal online application form - full details on how to apply can be found on https://www.bmh.manchester.ac.uk/study/research/apply/

Please select 'Primary Care and Health Services Research' under academic programme when completing your online application. 

Equality, Diversity and Inclusion

Equality, diversity and inclusion is fundamental to the success of The University of Manchester, and is at the heart of all of our activities. The full Equality, diversity and inclusion statement can be found on the website https://www.bmh.manchester.ac.uk/study/research/apply/equality-diversity-inclusion/