Rachel Brettell

Rachel graduated from Oxford University Medical School in 2010. She undertook a Primary Care Academic Foundation Programme at Imperial College in the Department of Primary Care and Public Health. During this time she published a national observational study looking at heart failure admission rates in England.

She then undertook GP training in Oxford as an Academic Clinical Fellow in the Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences. During this time she worked on a number of projects, including a Systematic Review looking at smoking cessation in adults with diabetes and a qualitative study examining UK Medical Students' attitudes towards general practice (which was highly commended in the medical education category of the RCGP Research Paper of the Year award 2019). She also undertook several projects focussing on Out of Hours (OOH) General Practice, examining end of life care, OOH prescribing and paediatric OOH contacts.

Rachel returned to the Department in December 2024 as an NIHR In Practice Fellow. She now works academically two days per week and clinically as a GP in Oxfordshire two days per week. She is a GP trainer and College Lecturer at St Catherine's College.

She is currently undertaking a literature review examining feedback mechanisms for OOH clinicians. She is also undertaking a qualitative research project with OOH providers examining feedback processes and safety. 

Her main interests are in OOH care, end-of-life care and medical education.