Caitlin Pilbeam

I am an interdisciplinary Medical Anthropologist, passionate about holistic wellbeing and different forms of healing. My research interests include novel qualitative methods and theory for applied healthcare research, and quality of life and end of life in local and global health contexts. I also co-develop and teach short courses on qualitative research methods.

My most recent research projects have focused on global health, epidemics, and health policy, building from my DPhil in Primary Care and Medical Anthropology. I have been involved in diverse research projects with the Centre for Tropical Medicine and Global Health at Oxford, and the World Health Organisation. These projects have included research into clinicians' experiences of caregiving, the development and role of guidelines, and living and dying, during high consequence infectious disease epidemics in differently-resourced healthcare contexts. 

During my DPhil, I conducted a two-year ethnographic and phenomenologically-informed exploration of living well with heart failure towards end of life in the UK. This research was funded by a Wellcome Trust studentship, affiliated with the Studies in Co-Creating Assisted Living Solutions project, and conducted under the supervision of Professor Trish Greenhalgh and Dr Caroline Potter.

I currently hold a Mildred Blaxter Postdoctoral Research Fellowship, from the Foundation for the Sociology of Health and Illness. During the Fellowship, I am taking forward my doctoral work to challenge dominant narratives of dying, and explore how we can better understand 'quality' towards end of life.  

I am also an Honorary Academic in the School of Nursing at the University of Auckland, collaborating with the Te Arai Research Group, and extending my understandings of and interest in death and dying in the context of New Zealand, and more specifically Māori end of life care and policy. 

I contribute to a number of courses in this Department and others in the University, focusing on cross-disciplinary audiences. 

• Introduction to Qualitative Research Methods - HERG Short Courses
• Introduction to Observation & Ethnography - HERG Short Courses
• Introduction to Analysing Qualitative Interviews - HERG Short Courses
• Introduction to NVivo - HERG Short Courses
• Qualitative Research Methods - MSc Evidence Based Health Care
• Ethnographic Methods & Writing, and Tutorials - MSc & MPhil Medical Anthropology