BEYOND Cancer
Our group aims to understand how a cancer diagnosis and its treatments affect long-term physical and mental health in the growing population of cancer survivors. Our previous research has mapped out a detailed picture of increased risks of cardiovascular disease, fractures, poor mental health, serious infections (such as influenza), and reduced quality of life across a wide range of cancers.
Patient and public involvement is central to our work. We founded the Beyond Cancer Patient Advocacy Group in 2024 to ensure that patients and caregivers are meaningfully involved in shaping our research questions, priorities, and interpretation of findings across our programme of work on cancer survivorship.
Our current research focuses on understanding a broader range of long-term outcomes after cancer, including risks of dementia, kidney disease, fertility and sexual health problems, and infections. We are also examining patterns of cancer treatment and their longer-term effects, including the use of androgen deprivation therapy after prostate cancer, the heart effects of anthracycline chemotherapy in breast cancer survivors, and the long-term effects of fluoropyrimidine-based chemotherapy in colorectal cancer survivors.
Funders: Wellcome, Royal Society, Cancer Research UK, Medical Research Council
Dates: 2015 – ongoing
LSHTM staff involved: Krishnan Bhaskaran (PI), Helena Carreira, Kirsty Anderson, Harriet Forbes, Matthew Hazell, William Wilson, Shamsudeen Mohamed
Inequalities in Cancer Outcomes Network (ICON)
ICON research focuses on the sociodemographic factors (such as age, sex, deprivation, ethnicity) affecting the healthcare journeys of people diagnosed with cancer. Using anonymised electronic health records routinely collected by the NHS and other secondary data sources, alongside patient and public involvement, we examine inequalities in cancer care and outcomes, with the aim of reducing these inequalities and improving outcomes for all patients diagnosed with cancer.
Funder: Cancer Research UK, NIHR, Pancreatic Cancer Research Fund, Wellcome Trust
Dates: 2020 – ongoing
LSHTM staff involved: Bernard Rachet, Aimilia Exarchakou, Katja Gravenhorst, Eva Kagenaar, Clemence Leyrat, Suping Ling, Ananya Malhotra, Camille Maringe, Manuela Quaresma, Wende Safari, Iain Timmins, Ellen Nolte
TACTIC: Timeliness of Access to Cancer Treatment - Improving Care
For people with cancer, NHS targets for timely treatment are not being met for surgery or radiotherapy which are the two main curative treatments for solid tumours. It is unclear how we can make better use of all available capacity for surgery and radiotherapy to provide more timely treatment. This 3.5 year project aims to investigate how to improve timeliness of curative surgery or radiotherapy for people with cancer by using an innovative cancer learning system model. The model will combine high quality data, innovative co-design techniques, and an inclusive online community to provide large-scale capability for understanding problems, developing solutions, and evaluating them.
Funder: NIHR
Dates: May 2025 – November 2028
LSHTM staff involved: Richard Grieve (co-PI), Ajay Aggarwal (co-PI), Julie Nossiter, Thomas Cowling, Bernard Rachet, David Cromwell, Kate Walker, Ruth Keogh
STOP-NCD
The NIHR Global Health Research Centre for non-communicable diseases in West Africa is part of the NIHR and hosted by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons (GCPS). We aim to address the urgent need for improving control of non-communicable diseases in West Africa, where healthcare has been traditionally neglected and driven by disease-specific programmes, with limited engagement of local communities. To do this we will use comprehensive and sustainable approaches to capacity strengthening, improving individual, organisational and system-level capacities of:
- researchers, particularly earlier-career staff, for high-quality applied NCD research,
- local communities, to engage with and improve behaviours and decisions affecting their health and
- policymakers and practitioners, to implement evidence-based NCD interventions.
We aim to improve health and wellbeing of populations in West Africa by developing capacity for high-quality research to inform improved prevention, diagnosis and treatment of inter-connected NCDs (hypertension, diabetes and co-existing stress, anxiety and depression).
Funder: NIHR
Dates: October 2022 – September 2027
LSHTM staff involved: Tolib Mirzoev (PI), Yasmin Jahan, Veronika Reichenberger, Adrianna Murphy, Pablo Perel, Neil Spicer, Elenor Hutchinson, Dina Balabanova, Martin McKee
Collaborators: Ashesi University (AU), Laboratoire d'Etudes et de Recherche sur les Dynamiques Sociales et le Développement Local [Research Laboratory on Social Dynamics and Local Development] (LASDEL) and Université Catholique de l'Afrique de l'Ouest - Unité Universitaire at Bobo-Dioulasso [Catholic University of West Africa - University Unit at Bobo-Dioulasso] (UCAO-UUB)
Catch-up Screen
Catch-up Screen is a research project offering cervical screening to women in their 60s and 70s from a urine sample they can take themselves at home.
Funder: Yorkshire Cancer Research
Dates: March 2022 – March 2027
LSHTM staff involved: Clare Gilham (PI), Julian Peto, Christian Rake
Contact: [email protected]
Long-term follow-up of the ARTISTIC and Manchester cervical screening cohorts
These long-term studies provide up to 30 years follow-up following HPV infection on the risks of cervical cancer and pre-cancer. HPV testing has now replaced cervical cytology in the national cervical cancer screening programme, and our primary aim is to provide recommendations on screening intervals and triage policy.
Funder: NIHR Health Technology Assessment
Dates: January 2013 – June 2026
LSHTM staff involved: Clare Gilham (PI), Julian Peto
TB-HEART study
The TB-HEART study is a cross-sectional and natural history study aiming to describe the burden and natural history of cardiac pathology among patients with pulmonary tuberculosis, with and without HIV, in Lusaka, Zambia. It is led by the Department of Non-communicable Diseases Epidemiology at LSHTM.
Funder: Wellcome Trust
Dates: September 2023 – September 2025
LSHTM staff involved: Marcello Scopazzini
CHANGE project
CHild malnutrition & Adult NCD: Generating Evidence on mechanistic links to inform future policy/practice
Child malnutrition is a major global public health problem. The need for optimal treatment programmes is immediate and great. Whilst treatment programmes do exist, obstacles to their success include the need to: (1) Ensure children thrive long-term – not just survive short term. Current programmes address the immediate risk of malnutrition-associated death. They do not account for increasing evidence that survivors are at greater risk of long term health problems from non-communicable disease (NCD). (2) Understand and measure more meaningful outcomes – including future health risks. (3) Question assumptions around rapid post-malnutrition weight gain (PMWG) Current programmes often encourage rapid weight gain but HIC data suggests that this might increase NCD risk. Whether this trade-off between too slow vs too fast weight recovery also applies in LMIC is unknown. Responding to and addressing these challenges, the CHANGE project is a three-year package of work with several aim and objectives.
Funder: MRC/GCRF
Dates: February 2021 – March 2025
LSHTM staff involved: Marko Kerac (PI), Natasha Lelijveld, Grant Mackenzie, Estelle McLean, Moffat Nyirenda
Collaborators: MEIRU, Malawi; Jimma University, Ethiopia; University of the West Indies, Jamaica; Cambridge University, UK; Southampton University, UK
Identifying Cancer Recurrence within Patient Care Pathways across Linked National Clinical Datasets
Information on cancer recurrence is not available in routine national clinical data, preventing important cancer research from being carried out in population-based studies. Providing this outcome would allow researchers and analysts to estimate the risk of recurrence for different groups of patients, to provide much needed evidence on the best combinations of treatments, and to evaluate the care and outcomes of patients whose cancer has recurred. This study aims to develop and validate methods to phenotype cancer recurrence after curative treatment for bowel cancer in linked national clinical datasets. And to assess how well the methods extend to breast and prostate cancer.
Funder: NIHR
Dates: April 2022 – November 2025
LSHTM staff involved: Kate Walker (PI), Alex Lewin, Julie Nossiter, Thomas Cowling, Ajay Aggarwal, David Cromwell, Linda Sharples
CHANGE: Alcohol misuse and associated adversities among conflict affected populations
The aim of CHANGE is to address alcohol misuse and associated adversities among conflict-affected populations in Uganda and Ukraine. CHANGE seeks to further develop Problem Management Plus (PM+), an evidence-based psychological intervention designed for people with psychological distress who are exposed to adversity. We will complement PM+ by adding an additional psychological component addressing alcohol misuse.
CHANGE is a partnership between HealthRight International Uganda, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, the National University of Kyiv-Mohyla, the University of Copenhagen, and WordsHelp Ukraine. CHANGE applies a participatory research approach with key stakeholders and conflict-affected populations involved in the development and implementation of the intervention.
Funders: Wellcome Trust and the Department of Health and Social Care, through the National Institute for Health Research using the UK’s Official Development Assistance Funding
Dates: July 2020 – July 2025
LSHTM staff involved: Daniela Fuhr, Bayard Roberts