Jo Protheroe

Biography

Professor Jo Protheroe has been a practising General Practitioner for over 25 years and has worked in various academic and research capacities, before joining Keele University in 2011.

She was appointed as Professor of General Practice in Keele Medical School in 2017, where she is Director of General Practice Education and is the Director of Integrated Clinical Academic training for Keele.

As Director of General Practice Education, she leads the multidisciplinary team responsible for delivery of the GP content of the curriculum, including over 19 weeks of GP Placement activity over 5 years.

As Director of Clinical Academic Training, she oversees a programme of NIHR funded research training for doctors in training in multiple specialties.

She is a national expert in the field of Health Literacy and continues to practise as a GP, a role which fuels her research in health literacy and patient participation in their health, especially those in disadvantaged groups.

Research and scholarship

Jo's research, influenced by her clinical practice, is focussed on two NHS priorities - the needs of socio-economically disadvantaged patients and the need for interventions to improve patient self-management in long-term conditions. Research has shown that patients with low health literacy have difficulty in participating in their health care, resulting in poorer health.

Jo is a nationally and internationally recognised expert in the field of Health Literacy, her work has had local and national impact addressing healthcare issues in the NHS at policy, patient and service and research levels. At policy level, she was appointed Honorary Health Literacy Clinical Advisor for NHSE and as co-founder and past Chair of the Health Literacy UK group (www.healthliteracy.org.uk), she chaired regular UK seminars and National Conferences; liaising with NHS England and policy groups and working closely as Academic Expert with Public Health Stoke-on-Trent to develop and implement a Health Literacy Strategy and action plans.

She is a named contributor to Government (All Party Parliamentary Group Primary care and Public Health Inquiry 2016) and College reports (RCGP, 2015).  More recently she has brought her extensive research experience into the field of medical education. It is her passion to share her research interests, influenced by her clinical practice as an inner-city GP, and help to shape and influence the development of new health care professionals at both undergraduate and postgraduate level.

 She has also been involved in disseminating health literacy research findings to a broad public audience, including House of Commons; Academy of Medical Science, patient groups (Patient Information Forum, National Voices) and the media (BBC Breakfast interview; national and local press).