Cookies on this website
We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you click 'Continue' we'll assume that you are happy to receive all cookies and you won't see this message again. Click 'Find out more' for information on how to change your cookie settings.

Contact information

Tel +44 (0)1865 617945

Jennifer Hirst

BSc MSc

NIHR Doctoral Research Fellow

  • Senior Systematic Reviewer and Research Officer

Biography

My research focusses primarily on diabetes.

There are currently over 3 million people in the UK who are living with diabetes and this number is forecast to increase to over 5 million by 2025 making diabetes and it's associated complications a major concern to healthcare providers and a huge financial burden. Optimisation of the treatment and care of people with diabetes is therefore important to help to ease this burden.

My doctoral fellowship is focussing on monitoring of glycated haemoglobin or HbA1c in primary care, specifically looking at whether use of point-of-care testing could improve the patient-clinician encounter and diabetes control. I have also recently been working with GP practices in the Thames Valley to gather data from patients who are having frequent measurements of their HbA1c to understand how quickly people's diabetes control changes after a change in diabetes medication. This work will improve our understanding of how HbA1c changes in response to a new diabetes medication and may even help to identify certain patients who may benefit from being tested more frequently.

In addition to this I have conducted several systematic reviews and meta-analyses looking at how ACE inhibitors affect development of early kidney disease in people with diabetes, and how much certain commonly used diabetes medications (metformin and sulfonylureas) improve diabetes control.


True True

Key Publications

5

Recent Publications

8 View 16 more »