Dr James H. Cross
Research Fellow
London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
Keppel Street
London
WC1E 7HT
United Kingdom
James H. Cross is a Research Fellow of Infectious Disease Epidemiology within the NEST360 Alliance and co-leads the Healthcare-Associated Infection Interest Group at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM). With a background in clinical microbiology and data science, James specialises in neonatal health in low- and middle-income countries.
His research is dedicated to identifying practical strategies to decrease neonatal infections by integrating clinical, health data science, and health systems-based research. James is particularly interested in enhancing clinical bacteriology services (e.g., blood culture and point-of-care sepsis diagnostics), antibiotic stewardship in high-burden environments, and reducing neonatal hospital-acquired infections, antimicrobial resistance, and mortality.
Within his leadership positions at LSHTM, James co-directs the NEST360 Infection Workstream and the associated NEST360/UNICEF Implementation Toolkit Health System Building Block. In this capacity, he supports the improvement of infection prevention, detection, and control across 67 newborn units in Malawi, Tanzania, Kenya, and Nigeria. James has also co-led the co-design and operationalisation of the NEST360 Neonatal Inpatient Dataset within these facilities, facilitating real-time data flow and analysis from over 120,000 newborn admissions annually for the NEST360 Quality Improvement Facility Dashboard.
James holds a BSc. Hons. in Medical Microbiology with a Year in Industry (MRCG at LSHTM) from the University of Bristol (2015) and a PhD in Epidemiology & Population Health from LSHTM (2020). James' LSHTM/Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation sponsored PhD studentship, conducted over five years at MRCG in The Gambia, culminated in a thesis titled "Iron and Infection: Neonatal Iron Transition". This work explored the immunological response of hepcidin-mediate hypoferremia in the early hours of postnatal life in full-term, preterm and low birthweight newborns.
Affiliations
Centres
Teaching
At LSHTM, James plays a role in teaching various aspects of epidemiology and medical statistics.
One of James' key responsibilities is acting as a short course organiser, tutor, and lecturer for the Introductory Course in Epidemiology Medical Statistics (ICEMS).
In addition, James co-leads the organisation and tutoring of the MSc Summer Project Data Management Short Course. Furthermore, he actively participates in teaching practical sessions and grading assignments for several MSc modules, such as Design and Analysis of Epidemiological Studies (DANES) and Basic Epidemiology. Moreover, he serves as a personal tutor for MSc Public Health for Development (LSHTM) and as a marker for Infectious Disease Distance Learning MSc projects.
James has supervised numerous MSc students during their LSHTM MSc Summer Projects. This work has led to the development of two publications. James welcomes further MSc students interested in projects related to neonatal infections or antibiotic use to reach out for potential collaboration.
Furthermore, James has previously supervised BSc (Year in Industry), MSc, and M.D. students from the University of Cardiff (UK) and Mercer University (US)
As an educator, James has earned the Postgraduate Certificate in Learning and Teaching (PGCILT) Module 1 and achieved Associate Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (AFHEA) status. He is currently pursuing PGCILT Module 2.
Research
James' current research centres on the NEST360 (Newborn Essential Solutions and Technologies) Alliance, a multi-partner collaboration across four African countries (Malawi, Kenya, Tanzania, and Nigeria). The alliance aims to innovate, implement, and evaluate a comprehensive package to improve hospital care for small and sick newborns in Africa.
As a Research Fellow, James supports vital components of a complex evaluation, focusing on mortality and health systems analyses to enhance care for small and sick newborns in 67 newborn units in Malawi, Tanzania, Kenya, and Nigeria.
As co-lead of the NEST360 Alliance Infection Workstream, Internal and External Groups, James' primary focus is knowledge generation and quality improvement. This encompasses the quantitative and qualitative use of neonatal blood culture (within the ward, laboratory, and interface), antibiotic stewardship, and outbreak detection (including aetiology and AMR) in all units implementing the NEST360 Alliance.
As a data scientist, James has also spearheaded the co-design and institutionalisation of a core neonatal inpatient dataset. This dataset includes essential variables for measuring impact, quality of care, and facility course correction. Utilising the NEST360 Neonatal Inpatient Dataset and its associated outputs (i.e., dashboards) enables the identification of critical system changes necessary to improve newborn health and survival. In addition, this information allows for optimising the NEST360 bundle for implementation and scale-up, as well as enhancing the NEST360 clinical and technical training programmes.
James is also a member of the Maternal and Newborn Health Group, Surveillance and Epidemiology of Drug-resistant Infections Consortium (SEDRIC), FIND Neonatal Sepsis Diagnostics Group, co-lead of the LSHTM REDCap User Group, and a previous PhD student representative (2016-2019) for the Antimicrobial Resistance Centre (LSHTM).
Selected Publications
