Background

Owen completed his BSc (Hons) at the University of Leeds (2016-2020) in Nutrition (International), with a one-year study abroad to Queensland University of Technology.  During his undergraduate studies Owen completed a Wellcome Biomedical Vacation scholarship under supervision of Dr James Smith. Owen’s project used unsupervised clustering to generate 2D cluster analysis that distinguished groups of patients according to clusters of circulating biomarkers, identifying those at a higher risk of early gestational diabetes mellitus.

Owen undertook an MSc in Epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (2020-2021). Owen completed an observational prospective population-based cohort study using data from the Clinical Practice Research Datalink, supervised by Dr Rohini Mathur. This study investigated if prescription of sodium glucose co-transport 2 inhibitors (SGLT2i) decreased the risk of COVID-19 in adults with type II diabetes mellitus in the UK, compared to prescription of dipeptidyl-peptidase 4 inhibitors (DPP4i). Owen used Cox Proportional Hazards Regression modelling to determine crude, multivariable and propensity score adjusted hazard ratios for this association. Owen was interested in investigating this association by ethnicity and socio-economic status.

 

Research Interests

Owen is a first year PhD student in the Cardiovascular Epidemiology Unit, Department of Public Health and Primary Care. He is under the supervision of Dr Angela Wood and is funded by the British Heart Foundation. Owen is interested in using electronic health records for improving cardiovascular risk prediction, specifically within minority populations. He is also interested in how we can better understand cardiovascular risk perception in the UK population.