Plenary: Cutting Edge Research

Professor Galina Velikova is an academic Medical Oncologist at the University of Leeds and Leeds Teaching Hospitals, UK with over 20 years’ track record of successful patient-centred research using electronic Patient-Reported Outcome Measures in daily practice and clinical trials. She led a National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) 5-year Programme Grant for applied research on patient self-reported symptoms and toxicity, using an online reporting system (QTool), uniquely integrated in electronic records, along re-designed care pathways for remote monitoring during cancer treatment to improve patient safety. Further research projects evaluate the use of the electronic system for remote monitoring and follow-up of cancer patients after treatment.

Professor Velikova has experience in leading collaborative research, both nationally and internationally such as Quality of Life sub-studies of international breast cancer trials (TACT2, SUPREMO). She is the past Chair of the British Psychosocial Oncology Society; past Chair of the European Organisation for Research and Treatment of Cancer (EORTC) Quality of Life Group; and past President of the International Society for Quality of Life Research (ISOQOL). Professor Velikova is currently the Co-Chair of the National Cancer Research Institute (NCRI) Living with and Beyond Cancer Group and is also a member of the board of the EORTC.

Professor Velikova is a practising oncologist (Consultant in Medical Oncology) with clinical work focused on systemic treatment of breast cancer patients with early and advanced disease.

Sally has front-line experience of primary care at its most challenging having been senior partner and GP trainer in a practice in the Welsh valleys. She entered a career in medical management in 2011 and was appointed to Assistant Medical Director for value-based care in the Aneurin Bevan University Health Board in 2014.

Still practising as a GP, Sally is now National Clinical Lead for Value-based and Prudent Healthcare in Wales, and Honorary Professor at Swansea School of Medicine. Her current interests include the utilisation of value-based principles to allocate resource in publicly funded systems, patient outcome data and digital transformation

Dr. Sajobi is Associate Professor of Biostatistics in the Department of Community Health Sciences at the University of Calgary, Canada. He has a long standing interest in statistical methods for measurement and analysis patient-reported outcomes in clinical trials and observational studies. He is currently exploring novel latent variable models and machine learning algorithms for response shift detection in longitudinal patient-reported outcomes studies.

Antoine is a biostatistician with a strong interest in measurement science applied to patient-centered outcomes. As a consultant, he uses his combined skillset in psychometrics and statistics to support pharmaceutical companies with their analyses of patient-centered outcomes data from clinical trials and observational studies in a wide variety of disease areas (oncology, hematology, neurology and rare diseases, among others). He currently is a member of the Board of Directors of the International Society of Quality of Life (ISOQOL) and has been a member of international research initiatives such as SPIRIT-PRO and NeuroMET-2.