Scottish Rural Health and Social Care Lunchtime Webinar Series

Event Programme

1230: Welcome - Prof Sandra MacRury, SRHP Executive Chair and Academic Lead, University of the Highlands and Islands

1235: Marissa Collins, Yunus Centre for Social Business and Health. Developing and evaluating an economic and ethico-legal framework for priority setting in health and social care - a rural prospective

Questions

1310: Andrea McColl, Highlands and Islands Enterprise. Introduction to the Business to Healthcare Programme that connects companies to the health and care sector.

Questions

1320: Discussion

1330: End

Chair

Prof Sandra MacRury, Consultant Physician, NHS Highland, Chair of Clinical Diabetes and SRHP Executive Chair and Academic Lead, University of the Highlands and Islands

I am a Consultant Physician with a specialty interest in Diabetes and Endocrinology working for NHS Highland. Since 2006 I have been Chair of Clinical Diabetes and from 2019 Head of the School of Health, Social Care and Life Sciences at the University of the Highlands and Islands. As a clinician practicing in a region with significant rural health challenges my academic interests have evolved around service delivery and innovations in diabetes and remote and rural health care. Within the University this has involved generating research projects and grant funding, establishing the Division of Rural Health and Wellbeing and securing funding to establish the Scottish Rural Health Partnership (SRHP) a membership organization hosted by the University. SRHP is predicated on knowledge exchange to facilitate multi-sector, multi-disciplinary collaboration with the ultimate goal of improving remote and rural health and social care both nationally and internationally.

Speakers

Marissa Collins, Research Fellow, Glasgow Caledonian University

Marissa's main area of interest is priority setting and resource allocation in health and social care, focussing on frameworks to facilitate health and social care organisations to conduct high quality priority setting and resource allocation with the resources available to them. This also forms the topic of her PhD work. In addition, Marissa is interested in economic evaluations of different interventions. Marissa is the lead researcher on a Chief Scientist Office (CSO) funded project to develop a framework for priority setting based on economics, ethics and law and implement and evaluate the use of this framework in Health and Social Care Partnerships in Scotland. Projects include:

- An economic evaluation of screening strategies for Hepatitis C which involves building a cost-effectiveness model to evaluate different screening strategies.

- An economic evaluation of an intervention which will help with urine leakage in people who have Parkinson’s.

Marissa is currently the Treasurer for the International Society for Priorities in Health. This society hosts a bi-annual conference focussing on research excellence in priority setting and decision making on health. She also teaches on the Health Economics module as part of the MPH.

Dr Andrea McColl, Senior Development Manager Life Sciences, Highlands and Islands Enterprise

Andrea is an experienced economic development specialist and supports life sciences and technology businesses across the Highlands and Islands in their growth ambitions. She also engages with potential and existing inward investors who are active in digital health, medical technologies, animal health and marine biotechnology. With a background in project management, marketing and graduate recruitment, she is passionate about growing the talent pool for life sciences and technology in the north of Scotland. She holds a PhD in biomedical research from the University of Dundee and volunteers as a STEM Ambassador in local schools.