Professor in Mental Health Epidemiology

Senior Postgraduate Research Tutor - Division of Psychology & Mental Health

Roger is based in the Centre for Mental Health & Safety. He is also the Senior Postgraduate Resarch Tutor for the Division of Psychology & Mental Health. 

He first moved to The University of Manchester in 1998, working as a research associate in the School of Primary Care and then at the Arthritis Research Campaign Epidemiology Unit.

During 1991-1998 Roger worked in the National Health Service, conducting perinatal epidemiological studies at the Confidential Enquiry into Stillbirths & Deaths in Infancy.

Research Interests:

• Understanding the pathways to self-destructive, violent and hazardous behaviour in young people
• Primary care patient safety for people who have harmed themselves
• Suicide risk among offender populations and in individuals who are violent or aggressive
• Determinants of suicide risk factors in schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, personality disorders and eating disorders
• Suicide risk in people diagnosed with major physical illnesses
• Cause-specific mortality among infants and children with mentally ill parents

Current Grant Funding:

• European Research Council: 2014-2018 (1.5 million Euros). Understanding the determinants of suicidal behaviour, serious accidents and violence in young people

• Department of Health, Policy Research Programme: 2013-2015 (£203,000). Self-harm in primary care patients: a nationally representative cohort study examining patterns of attendance, treatment and referral, and risk of self-harm repetition, suicide and other causes of premature death

Current collaborators:

• Preben B. Mortensen, Carsten B. Pedersen. National Centre for Register-based Research, University of Aarhus, Denmark
• Seena Fazel. Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, UK
• Bo Runeson. Department of Clinical Neuroscience, Karolinska Institute, Sweden
• Darren Ashcroft. Centre for Pharmacoepidemiology and Drug Safety, Manchester Pharmacy School, University of Manchester, UK
• Evan Kontopantelis. Centre for Primary Care, Institute of Population Health, University of Manchester, UK
• Richard Emsley. Centre for Biostatistics, Institute of Population Health, University of Manchester, UK
• Yvonne Awenat. School of Psychological Sciences, University of Manchester, UK
• Carolyn Chew-Graham. Research Institute of Primary Care and Health Sciences, Keele University, UK

Observational studies of rare adverse outcomes in mental health epidemiology. In particular, large cohort and nested case-control studies using population-based data from the UK, Denmark and Sweden.

• PhD in Medicine (Psychiatric Epidemiology): University of Manchester (2007)
• MSc in Epidemiology & Biostatistics: University of Manchester (2002)
• MA in Applied Social Research: University of Manchester (1995)
• BA in History & Politics: University of Nottingham (1990)