Our Team

Prof Sarah Bailey

Associate Professor of Primary Care Diagnostics

University of Exeter

Sarah is the co-lead of the HELP Flag project. She has been studying the link between platelet count and cancer risk in primary care since 2014.

Prof Dawn Lee

Associate Professor of Health Economics and Health Policy

University of Exeter

Dawn is the co-lead for HELP Flag and lead for Work Package 2, the Health Economic evaluation of HELP Flag.

Dr Raff Calitri

Senior Research Fellow

University of Exeter

Raff is a behavioural scientist with expertise in the implementation and evaluation of health interventions. He has a dual role on the HELP Flag team. He is the study manager and lead for Work Package 3, which explores the acceptability of the HELP Flag innovation.

Dr Luke Mounce

Statistician and Senior Research Fellow

University of Exeter

Luke is a Senior Research Fellow in the cancer diagnostics team and has expertise in data science and applied statistics. He was lead researcher on the study that suggested platelet thresholds indicating increased cancer risk, which underpin HELP Flag. As part of the HELP Flag team, Luke will oversee obtaining the data routinely collected by hospitals for the clinical- and cost-effectiveness evaluations and will supervise the statistical analyses.

Dr Samuel Merriel

Clinical Senior Lecturer

University of Manchester

Sam is a GP in North West England and Clinical Senior Lecturer at the University of Manchester. He will be leading the clinical evaluation of HELP Flag to understand the impact on patient outcomes and GP practices who implement HELP Flag.

Prof Willie Hamilton

Professor of Primary Care Diagnostics

University of Exeter

Willie’s role in the team is largely a clinical/organisational one. He identified the importance of raised platelets over twenty years ago and has been very involved in the research since then. Getting research findings into clinical practice is the end goal, and Willie is here to ensure the clinical side of it is always remembered.

Lucy Kirkland

Graduate Research Assistant

University of Exeter

Lucy co-leads the project’s Public and Patient Involvement and Engagement (PPIE) with Celia, working closely with public contributors to embed diverse lived experience throughout our research. Using Lucy’s experience in social work and community engagement, Celia and Lucy have helped design a work plan that enables contributors to influence each work package in meaningful and tangible ways.

Celia Butler

Patient and Public Involvement and Engagement

University of Exeter

Celia is a Staff Engineer at Synopsys, where she collaborates with engineers, researchers, and medical professionals to develop image-based models that address complex challenges. As a co-applicant for the HELP Flag Project, Celia leads the Public and Patient Involvement initiative with Lucy Kirkland, recruiting six members from two distinct regions to guide the project and ensure diverse perspectives are represented.

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Dr Lexy Newbold

Research Fellow

University of Exeter

Lexy joined the team as the qualitative researcher working on the process evaluation aspect of HELP Flag. She interviews GPs and NHS staff to hear their views on the acceptability of HELP Flag as an intervention to improve non-specific cancer diagnosis. She will also ask them how the implementation has gone, and where improvements can be made, before analysing the results and reporting back.

Misghina Weldegiorgis

Postdoctoral Research Associate

University of Manchester

Misghina analyses NHS primary and secondary care data to evaluate the effectiveness of the HELP Flag intervention, working with the University of Exeter team to deliver high-quality insights at key project milestones. He also supports the delivery and evaluation of patient and public involvement activities.

Chrissie Walker

Senior Research Manager

South West Secure Data Environment

Chrissie defines and sources data requirements for the project. She is part of the NHS South West Secure Data Environment which provides safe and secure access to NHS data from the South West region for research.

Marijke Shakespeare

Project Administrator

University of Exeter

Marijke supports the team with administrative aspects of the project, including finance, meetings, and documentation.

Amy Tregidgo

Project Administrator

University of Exeter

Amy supports the team with administrative aspects of the project, including finance, meetings, and documentation.

Monkia Sledziowska

Research Fellow in Health Economics

University of Exeter

Monika is a Research Fellow in Health Economics with experience in computational biology and data science. Monika is building a health economic model of the HELP Flag intervention which will form the basis of the cost-effectiveness analysis for Work Package 2.