Jan is from West Yorkshire and is recently retired from a role in research administration. Prior to this worked for many years in the education sector as a project/business manager and school design advisor.
A member of the public Jan has lived experience of a lifelong medical condition has a son with a different lifelong medical condition and has been a carer for parents with cancer and dementia. This has given her a long and varied experience of NHS services including palliative and social care.
Jan has varied PPI experience with NIHR as a funding committee member and public reviewer. Is a member of public advisory groups for local and national projects and also has PPI roles with HDR-UK , CRUK and MQ. She is passionate and committed to elevating the PPI role in health research and empowering patients and the public to understand and engage within it. She is particularly interested in developing the relationships between researchers and PPI members, sharing knowledge, training and removing the barriers to learning. Public trust in consenting to the use of their health data for research and developing data literacy training for the public are key areas of interest.
She has taken part in webinars and Vlogs to promote PPIE and spoken and facilitated at conferences. She has chaired PPI groups and made a short film about the importance of patients in health research.