Janet Deane

Janet originally qualified as a biological and chemical scientist in University College Cork, Ireland, where her work in organ and cellular research inspired her interest in translational medicine and human performance.  In 2001, Janet graduated as a Physiotherapist from King’s College London and has since worked as a senior musculoskeletal specialist fulfilling roles in the NHS (Guy’s and St. Thomas’ hospital), charitable organisations (British Association of Performing Arts Medicine) and the private sector where she has applied an evidence based approach to patient management and gained a unique insight into arthritis and low back pain which have become key research interests.

As a specialist musculoskeletal Physiotherapist, Janet committed to translational research through her work on the FASTER low back pain rehabilitation study with Professor Alison McGregor at Imperial College and advanced MSc musculoskeletal research in joint hypermobility with Rosemary Keer and Dr. Jane Simmonds at University College London.

In 2012, Janet qualified with a Postgraduate Diploma in Higher Education and became a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (FHEA).  She has since undertaken musculoskeletal lectureship roles in both BSc and MSc Physiotherapy programmes at University College Limerick, Ireland and King’s College London and has contributed towards the supervision of student research projects (BSc and MSc) at King’s College London, University College London, Imperial College and the University of Limerick, Ireland.  

Janet was recently awarded a PhD in Clinical Biomechanics by Imperial College London. This research was funded by a Versus Arthritis Clinical Doctoral Fellowship and supervised by Professor Alison McGregor, Dr Paul Strutton and Dr Andrew Phillips. This study aimed to understand the impact of Lumbar Disc Degeneration and recurrent low back pain by evaluating biomedical sub-classifiers for this condition using MRI, kinematic and EMG analysis methods.  

Since completing her PhD Janet has worked with the OATechplus Network, Cardiff University and Imperial College London as a Postdoctoral Research Associate. The aim of this research is to determine factors impacting upon arthritis research translation in order to develop an arthritis ‘impact toolkit’ for patients, researchers and clinicians.  

More recently, Janet has become one of the first NIHR Clinical Lecturers in Musculoskeletal Physiotherapy at the University of Manchester where, in addition to continuing her research in the field of low back pain, Janet will lead the Allied Health Professional (AHP) research transformation agenda and enhance AHP research capacity and capability within the NHS.

Janet has been privileged to present at national and international conferences, winning several awards including: The ‘New Investigator’s Award’ and the ‘Secretary’s Award’ by the Society for Back Pain Research (SBPR) U.K. and the Imperial College ‘Research Community Fund’ award. Through funds awarded to by the United Kingdom Spine Societies Board (UKSSB) Janet has built collaborations and advanced her skills in spinal technology and disseminated collaborative findings nationally and internationally.

Janet is a member of the Chartered Society of Physiotherapists, the Health and Care Professions Council, the Musculoskeletal Association of Chartered Physiotherapists and SBPR. Janet is also a reviewer for the NIHR Health Technology Assessment (HTA) and Research for Patient Benefit (RfPB) programmes, the Medical Research Council (MRC) and is a Chief Executive Committee member for the SBPR and the Council of Allied Health Professional Research (CAHPR) London.