ISTM

I obtained my first degree (BA in biological sciences) with the Open University (OU) whilst serving as a combat medic in the Army. I left the Army in 1993 after 22 years to pursue a career in science and initially went to Manchester University where I obtained a BSc in molecular biology and biochemistry.

I worked as a research assistant in Biological Sciences at Keele from 1995. The main emphasis of this work was the transfection and use of reporter constructs in pancreatic b-cell lines to assess the involvement of aberrant heterotrimeric G proteins in the process of insulin secretion.

In 1997 I went to the School of Pharmacy & Biomolecular Sciences in Brighton where I completed my PhD on work funded by the British Diabetic Foundation. The core of this work revolved around the characterisation of insulitis and apoptosis in a diabetic rat model (BB rat) of human type I diabetes using an immunological and molecular biological approach.

In 2001 I took up a post as Research Fellow at Birmingham University Medical School on work funded by the Arthritis Research Campaign. This work explored the ability of endothelial cells to capture leukocytes in flow in response to cytokines and/or via interaction with the stromal environment. In these studies the stromal environment was provided by rheumatoid fibroblasts co-cultured with endothelial cells in a flow-based model of inflammation.

I have just finished three year tenure as lead researcher for a group based within the Research Institute for Life Course Studies at Keele on a study funded by the EU aimed to explore the participation of older people in clinical trials. The study included nine European countries and the Keele group was responsible for leading on the majority of the study. Main tasks were setting up the infrastructure to gather and analyse data using questionnaires from professionals associated with trials in one form or another and explore the views of older people and their carers using focus groups.

The data has being used to inform a published charter for older people in clinical trials and we have one peer-reviewed publication from this with two more in progress.

In July 2010 I began a new role as research associate within the stroke research group, which comes under the auspices of Institute for Science & Technology in Medicine.

Since July 2010 my role has been Research Associate within the Stroke Research Group. The main thrust of the post initially was to analyse data from recent stroke trials and produce manuscripts for publication of the results.

We are currently conducting reviews of various aspects of stroke treatment that are in clinical use but are changing rapidly and/or lack proven clinical efficacy. Areas of interest include oxygen intervention for the treatment of acute ischaemic stoke, approaches to recanalization of vessels following ischaemic stroke (including thrombectomy devices) and effects of contrast media on endothelial cells. We are preparing a literature review on published and on-going thrombectomy trials and also setting up some practical studies on the effects of contrast media on endothelial cells and trialling different thrombectomy devices in models of the cerebral circulation. We hope that these pilot studies will underpin applications for future research/funding in stroke and stroke education.

I have been employed by the OU since 1995 as an Associate Lecturer (AL) teaching the Science Foundation course and third level Molecular & Cell Biology course.

In addition to teaching, I have had several consultancies in the molecular science and health sciences programmes in the Centre for Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL) of the OU. These have been aimed at supporting students and/or tutors within the distance-learning environment.

I was also a consultant for the development of new foundation degree in Paramedic Sciences that has been developed by the OU based at Milton Keynes. This culminated in the production of a module on handling hostile and major incidents for use in the course; this was published in October 2010.

The most recent and active consultancy is that of a Pathways tutor in a pilot study in the West Midlands region. The study focuses on supporting first level students, the basic premise of the pilot is that additional contact between tutor and student at certain key points in the academic will have an overall beneficial effect on pass rates, retention and progression to other courses. The pilot study officially ended in October 2011 but has been granted an extension to 2012.

Since November 2006 I have been actively involved in the production and delivery of staff development sessions aimed at supporting ALs in the West Midlands Region. The emphasis of the training revolves around methods of interacting with electronic assignments from students. In addition I currently provide training and support to ALs in the use various tools associated with the OU’s Virtual Learning Environment (VLE). These tools include forums, wikis, Blogs and an online synchronous teaching tool (Elluminate). I am also actively involved in developing materials for use within Elluminate sessions for ALs who undertake training in that tool to provide online support for students unable to attend face-to-face sessions.