Chair: Prof Nick Hulbert-Williams, Edge Hill

Nick Hulbert-Williams is a Professor of Psychology and Head of the Department of Psychology at Edge Hill University. He completed an undergraduate degree in Psychology with Clinical and Health Psychology at the University of Wales, Bangor, and was awarded his PhD from Cardiff University School of Medicine in 2009. Nick holds qualifications in Health Psychology and is a British Psychological Society Chartered Coaching Psychologist. Nick was previously Chair of BPOS from 2010-2014 and returned to the role in 2024. In the interim period Nick was Chair of the International Psycho-Oncology Society (IPOS) Research Committee, and Associate Editor for IPOS’s Journal of Psychosocial Oncology Research & Practice. Nick holds an Adjunct Professorship at Flinders University, Australia.

Nicks’ research explores the psychological impact of cancer for people with a diagnosis, and their family members and caregivers. His work has included quantitative surveys of risk prediction and theoretical modelling, through to clinical trials of interventions. Much of his current work is focussing on the use of Acceptance and Commitment Coaching in oncology settings, and a programme of work developing and testing the Finding My Way UK digital intervention platform.

You can email Nick on: chair@bpos.org

Secretary: Lauren Matheson, Oxford Brookes

Dr Lauren Matheson is a Research Fellow in the Supportive Cancer Care Research group at Oxford Brookes University. Lauren is a qualitative researcher with an academic background in Health Psychology. She has conducted research in the field of Psychosocial Oncology for over 13 years including research developing self-management interventions to promote behaviour change in cancer patients, and research exploring the psychosocial impact of cancer on patients and caregivers. Her research projects include development of an intervention to support people with breast cancer to recognise and report symptoms of recurrence, development of a behaviour change intervention to support self-management in patients with head and neck cancer on a patient-initiated follow-up trial (PETNECK2 study), and a study exploring experiences of lifestyle behaviour change post breast cancer diagnosis.

Lauren completed her undergraduate degree in Psychology at the University of Southampton (2007), followed by an MSc in Health Psychology at the University of the West of England (2008), and a qualitative PhD at Oxford Brookes University (2016), which explored psychosocial adjustment to cancer in young adulthood, focusing on the experiences of patients with testicular cancer and Hodgkin Lymphoma.

You can email Lauren on: secretary@bpos.org

David Wright is a Senior Research Fellow at the Macmillan Survivorship Research Group (MSRG), University of Southampton. He has periodically worked in cancer survivorship research over the last 18 years. A social scientist by background, David first worked for the Group as a Research Fellow, managing the Macmillan Listening Study. This influential project was the first national research prioritisation exercise involving people affected by cancer and set the agenda for cancer survivorship research. Since then, he has worked as a freelance researcher for different clients including the University of Oxford, the Stroke Association, the NIHR Evaluation, Trials and Studies Coordinating Centre and the European Commission.

In 2018, he returned to the MSRG, working on studies that seek to enhance the understanding of recovery and self-management of people living with and beyond cancer, and evaluating interventions designed to support self-management. David is also responsible for managing evaluations of workforce development and interventions designed to support personalised care. He also has extensive experience of patient and public involvement in research and values working with people affected by cancer as equal partners in the research process.

You can email David on: treasurer@bpos.org

Website & media representative: Rachel Starkings

Rachel is a Research Fellow within the Sussex Health Outcomes Research and Education in Cancer group (SHORE-C) at the Brighton and Sussex Medical School. She has been involved with both qualitative and quantitative projects, such as the development and validation of two new scales to capture the impact of cancer for patients and informal caregivers. Rachel has an interest in psychological pre-habilitation and rehabilitation, having previously worked on a project assessing the biological and psychological impacts of relaxation interventions for women with breast cancer. Rachel is also involved with the assessment of training interventions for healthcare professionals discussing concepts of risk with patients.

Rachel completed her undergraduate degree at the Harriet L Wilkes Honors College of Florida Atlantic University, with a double major in Psychology and Political Science. She went on to complete her MSc in General Psychology at the University of Plymouth. Before becoming a Research Fellow, Rachel worked as a Senior Clinical Trial Coordinator at the Royal Marsden. She managed both the Head, Neck and Thyroid group as well as the Renal and Melanoma firm and was involved in numerous clinical trials, both academic and commercial in nature.

You can email Rachel on: website@bpos.org

Psychology Representative: Michael Baliousis

Michael Baliousis is a Clinical Academic Clinical Psychologist and Research & PPI Lead at the Cancer Psychology Service, Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust. He is also a Research Tutor at the Trent Doctorate in Clinical Psychology (Universities of Nottingham & Lincoln).

Michael leads a multidisciplinary research programme focused on enhancing the psychological well-being of people with cancer, with an emphasis on prevention, personalisation, and the integration of digital technology and prognosis.

A registered Clinical Psychologist with the Health and Care Professions Council, Michael is also qualified in Systemic Psychotherapy. He has extensive clinical and leadership experience within complex NHS systems, having played a key role in embedding clinical research and PPI infrastructure, fostering trauma- and psychologically-informed care, establishing staff training and supervision programmes, and driving systemic change to improve healthcare services.

SIG lead: Lynn Calman

Lynn Calman is a Principal Research Fellow and Deputy Director of Macmillan Survivorship Research Group at the University of Southampton. The Macmillan funded MSRG research programme, is designed to inform the development of more efficient and effective services to support survivors and enhance their recovery.  The MSRG programme has two themes – understanding recovery and self-management following primary treatment and developing and testing interventions to support self-management. The team are running large cohort studies of cancer survivors (CREW, HORIZONS) to understand health and wellbeing of cancer patients from diagnosis and across the life course and have developed online resources and decision aids such as RESTORE to support confidence to manage symptoms and problems. Lynn also leads her own programme of research to understand the needs of people living with treatable but not curable cancer. She has a long history of working closely with people affected by cancer as Research Partners in the development and conduct of research projects.

Lynn is an adult and mental health nurse. She undertook her PhD at the University of Edinburgh (2005) and joined MSRG in 2012 after completing an MRC funded post-doctoral fellowship in health services research and health of the public at the University of Manchester; to develop an intervention for the follow-up of lung cancer patients after primary treatment. She has a particular interest in living with and beyond lung cancer and is a member of the NCRI Lung Cancer Group.

AHP representative: Lucy McGeagh

Dr Lucy McGeagh is a Chartered Health Psychologist and Senior Research Fellow within the Supportive Cancer Care Research Group at Oxford Brookes University. Lucy joined Oxford Brookes in June 2020 to work primarily on a large NIHR funded programme grant SWEET ‘Supporting Women with adhErence to adjuvant Endocrine Therapy’ following breast cancer. Lucy is the senior researcher on this programme, which includes development of a support package, feasibility study, UK wide RCT and potential NHS implementation. Over the past 18 years Lucy has lead qualitative research in a range of cancer populations including exploring the physical and psychological impact of treatment, behaviour change following a cancer diagnosis and cancer prevention and behaviour change in young mothers from areas of deprivation. Lucy has developed multiple behaviour change interventions and designed and implemented a number of RCTs in men with prostate cancer. Lucy works with individuals with a lived experience of a variety of cancers, including breast, prostate and pancreatic, and has additional interests in acute oncology, cancer diagnosis during pregnancy and paediatric oncology.

Lucy has worked in cancer research and behaviour change for the duration of her career. Following her BSc in Psychology (2004, UWE), her Masters in Health Psychology research focused on young male response to testicular cancer diagnosis (2006, University of Bath). Lucy’s PhD explored Implications of Smoke-Free Legislation on NHS Stop Smoking Services and Cessation Behaviour (2010, University of Bath), achieving a Doctorate in Health Psychology the following year (2011, University of Bath). Lucy went on to hold academic posts at the University of Bath (2010-2012), University of Nottingham (2011 – 2012) and University of Bristol (2012 – 2019). Prior to joining Oxford Brookes University in 2020, Lucy was National Research Manager for GenesisCare UK, a private cancer hospital (2019 – 2020).

Lucy has an ongoing passion for research in cancer, behaviour change, survivorship and support.

Medical oncology representative: Carey MacDonald-Smith

Carey is an Associate Specialist Medical Oncologist at the North Wales Cancer Treatment Centre, specialising in Melanoma, Renal carcinoma and Immunotherapy. Carey is Immunotherapy Lead for North Wales, having set up the first Immunotherapy service in Wales in 2017, followed by a dedicated North Wales Immunotherapy Toxicity Service at the end of 2021 after business case approval. Carey is passionate about improving the experience of patients on immunotherapy and the challenges it presents both in terms of toxicity management as well as the complexities in follow up involved.

Carey was awarded Fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians (FRCP) in 2019 for her work in Immunotherapy in North Wales, as well as collaboration into Psychosocial Oncology research as an Honorary Research Associate with the University of Chester at the time. She now contributes to the RCP as a Fellowship Grading Panellist

Carey is passionate about improving psychosocial oncology care for patients and is particularly interested in research which can be integrated into care within a busy NHS service, with limited resources, to ensure equality of access. Her masters research study – titled “The experience of living with Brain Metastases” – was a qualitative study exploring the impact of brain metastases and treatment on patients. Carey, most recently, was on the steering Committee for the UK Finding My Way Study. She is once again delighted to be Medical Oncology Representative on the BPOS executive committee having been Medical Oncology representative for 2 terms from 2012-2018.

When not at work, Carey can be found tending to the ever-increasing demands of her two feisty grey Connemara Ponies, Leo and youngster Limerick – which most definitely keep her grounded!

Palliative care representative: Natasha Campling

Natasha began her career as a cancer and palliative nurse at the Royal Marsden Hospital, London before becoming an academic researcher in 2000. She undertook her PhD at King’s College London (2006), funded by a doctoral training award from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, and joined the University of Southampton in 2015. She is an Associate Professor in Palliative and End of Life Care within the postgraduate taught team in the School of Health Sciences, responsible for providing specialist modules for expert cancer care clinicians as part of the MSc in Professional Practice in Health Sciences.  She combines this with her research programme focused on understanding experiences and processes during the last year of life and into bereavement, to improve support for patients and family caregivers during this time.

Representative: Claire Foster

Claire graduated with a BSc in Psychology from University of Warwick in 1992, a Masters in Psychological Research Methods from University of Exeter in 1994 and a PhD in Health Psychology from University of Exeter in 1998. She worked at the Institute of Cancer Research for 7 years on the first UK cohort study to assess psychosocial impact of predictive genetic testing for BRCA1/2 funded by Cancer Research UK. She joined the University of Southampton in 2004 where she led a programme of research funded by Macmillan Cancer Support (Macmillan Research Unit, later Macmillan Survivorship Research Group). She is Professor of Psychosocial Oncology and Co-Director of the Centre for Psychosocial Research in Cancer: CentRIC in the School of Health Sciences, University of Southampton. Her research focuses on advancing understanding of the impact of cancer on people’s lives and developing and testing solutions to manage this impact. Her research includes UK wide prospective cohort studies (CREW, HORIZONS, UK co-lead for Movember TrueNTH Global Registry) to understand the consequences of cancer over time, how this can affect people’s daily lives, and identifying areas for intervention. The CentRIC team is developing complex interventions, including web-based resources, to enhance confidence to self-manage cancer related problems such as fatigue (RESTORE) and mental health (CanEMPOWER, led by Prof Lynn Calman) working closely with NHS Partners to inform health care transformation to improve psychosocial outcomes; and developing web-based decision aids to support people facing decisions about genetic testing for cancer susceptibility and associated risk management (Breast Cancer Choices funded by Breast Cancer Now; Lynch Choices funded by Cancer Research UK). Claire was Chair Elect of BPOS in 2009, hosted the 30^th Anniversary BPOS conference in Southampton in 2013 and hosted the BPOS annual conference again in 2018. She now serves on the BPOS Executive. Claire is Co-Chair of the Ehealth and AI Special Interest Group for International Psychosocial Oncology Society (IPOS) and is a member of the Editorial Board for Psycho-Oncology.