Professor Nicholas Mays
Professor of Health Policy
London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
15-17 Tavistock Place
London
WC1H 9SH
United Kingdom
I have diverse experience in the field of health policy analysis and evaluation. Before coming to the School I had worked in the National Health Service in England (with spells in public health and in representing consumers' interests), in academic health services research (at the Universities of Leicester and London (St Thomas' Hospital Medical School), and the Queen's University of Belfast), in the independent sector (with a think-tank, the King's Fund, where I was director of health services research) and as a civil servant (as a policy adviser with the New Zealand Treasury). I joined the School in May 2003 after almost five years in New Zealand. I maintain a direct involvement in health and wider social policy-making by continuing to provide periodic advice to the New Zealand Ministry of Health and the Treasury.
Between its inception in 2010 and 2023, I directed the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Policy Research Programme-funded Policy Innovation and Evaluation Research Unit (PIRU) which is a collaboration between LSHTM, the Care Policy and Evaluation Centre (CPEC) at the London School of Economics and Glasgow University (http://www.piru.ac.uk/). I continue to be involved in research with PIRU, currently focusing on public, patient and professional attitudes and views towards the use of animal organs for human kidney and heart transplants.
Affiliations
Centres
Teaching
I am one of the co-organisers of the Masters module, Health Policy, Process and Power. I also contribute to the modules on Health Systems, and Evaluation of Public Health Interventions.
I am co-author of a text book on understanding the policy process called Making health policy. A new edition was published in September 2023. I have published other methods texts including Synthesizing qualitative and quantitative evidence: a guide to methods with Cathy Pope and Jennie Popay in 2007, also published by Open University Press. The fourth edition of the introductory textbook, Qualitative research in health care edited with Catherine Pope, was published in 2020 by Wiley.
Research
I am interested both in the rigorous analysis of contemporary health policy issues (research 'for' policy) as well as research designed to improve understanding of how and why health and wider public policy is made and implemented in the way that it is (research 'on' policy). My research 'on' the policy process includes an analysis of the policy making style under the Labour Government of Tony Blair, a case study of the formation of the NHS Plan 2000 (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/1467-856X.12005/pdf) and a study of major policy pilots in health and social care, and how they have been evaluated.
My main research activity 'for' policy relates to evaluations of innovative national policies and programmes in England. I currently co-lead two major NIHR-funded evaluations, one of novel Mental Health Support Teams in schools and colleges (with Jo Ellins, University of Birmingham) and the other of the Pharmacy First programme (with Rebecca Glover, LSHTM).
I have a longstanding interest in the role of primary health care in health systems, with a recent focus on the emergence of 'at scale' general practice organisations, including Primary Care Networks, in England. I collaborated on a review of the evidence on their development and effectiveness http://www.nuffieldtrust.org.uk/sites/files/nuffield/publication/large-…
Selected Publications
