Joht Singh Chandan

My research examines how violence, trauma and wider social adversity shape health across the life course, and how health and public services can intervene earlier to prevent harm and reduce inequalities.

My work brings together public health, primary care, data science and health systems research. I use large linked datasets spanning primary and secondary care, maternity, social care, policing and justice to reveal patterns of risk, service contact and longer-term outcomes that are often missed when systems are studied separately. I combine this with qualitative research, evidence synthesis, co-production, implementation science and pragmatic evaluation to develop and assess responses that can work in routine services.

A central strand of my research concerns violence against women and children, including domestic abuse and childhood maltreatment. My work has examined the mental and physical health consequences of violence, improved how its burden is measured, and developed trauma-informed approaches to prevention and care. Through my NIHR Research Professorship, I am leading a programme to improve the health and wellbeing of women and children affected by violence, with lived experience and survivor leadership embedded throughout.

I lead the NIHR Global Health Research Group on Violence Against Women and Children, a partnership working across South Africa, Mexico, India, Brazil, Peru and Sri Lanka. The programme brings together survivors, researchers, practitioners and policymakers to strengthen the measurement of violence, understand its health and economic consequences, evaluate prevention strategies and build sustainable research capacity.

I am also Co-lead for Research for the NIHR Maternity Disparities Consortium, which brings together universities, NHS organisations, local authorities, charities and communities to address inequalities before, during and after pregnancy. My wider portfolio includes gambling-related harms, particularly how trauma, adversity and unequal social conditions shape pathways to harm, and place-based approaches to prevention delivered through primary care, local government and voluntary and community organisations.

Across these programmes, my aim is not only to describe inequalities, but to identify where systems fail people, design better responses and produce evidence that changes policy and practice at scale. I work closely with people with lived experience, clinicians, public health teams, local authorities, policymakers and community organisations so that the questions we ask and the solutions we develop reflect the priorities of those most affected.

My research has informed national and international policy. I have been an expert advisor to the UK Government’s National Youth Strategy, and serve as an expert adviser to the National Maternity and Neonatal Investigation.

My research is also informed by public service. I am an Honorary Consultant in Public Health with UKHSA and serve voluntarily as a Special Constable with West Midlands Police. This experience has shaped my interest in how health, local government, community and justice systems can work together to prevent harm.

DPhil supervision

I welcome enquiries from prospective DPhil students interested in violence and adversity, health inequalities, women’s and maternity health, gambling-related harms, linked data, public health intervention research and system-level prevention.