OHE’s Director of Research, Professor Nancy Devlin, to Take up New Role at the University of Melbourne

OHE’s Professor Nancy Devlin will be leaving OHE to take up a new role at the University of Melbourne, Australia, from January 2019.

Nancy will be Professor of Health Economics and Director of the Centre of Health Policy in the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health. The Centre of Health Policy comprises research units in Demography and Ageing; Evaluation and Implementation Science; Public Health and Law; Cancer Health Services Research; and Health Economics (the latter of which Nancy will also lead).

OHE’s Professor Nancy Devlin will be leaving OHE to take up a new role at the University of Melbourne*, Australia, from January 2019.

Nancy will be Professor of Health Economics and Director of the Centre for Health Policy in the Melbourne School of Population and Global Health. The Centre for Health Policy comprises research units in Demography and Ageing; Evaluation and Implementation Science; Public Health and Law; Cancer Health Services Research; and Health Economics (the latter of which Nancy will also lead).

Nancy has been OHE’s Director of Research for 10 years, during which time she has led the development of OHE’s research programmes, the growth and diversification of OHE’s research funding, and the development of OHE’s research team. Nancy commented,

I am really proud of what we have been able to achieve at OHE over the last decade. OHE is undertaking a wide range of original theoretical and empirical analyses and is highly productive in publishing work of direct relevance to health policy. The OHE team is a wonderful group of people – hard working, seriously smart and fun. I am confident OHE will continue to produce important work.

I am very excited to be joining the University of Melbourne and to take up this new challenge of leading its Centre for Health Policy and its health economics unit. The University of Melbourne provides an amazing clinical and academic network for research collaborations between health economics and other disciplines. The School of Population and Global Health, within which the Centre is located, has an excellent reputation for its work on both local and global issues. I look forward to working with my new colleagues – and continuing existing collaborations in the UK and elsewhere – to develop a research programme of relevance to health care decision makers in Australia and internationally.

Adrian Towse, OHE’s Director, said,

I would like to thank Nancy for all of her hard work for OHE. She has built OHE’s reputation for high quality research with high profile projects in methods and in applied work of direct relevance to public policy. Importantly, she has also built a team and a culture that means that OHE will continue to thrive with a new Director of Research after her departure. I am grateful for this and wish Nancy every success in her new position. Australia’s gain is the UK’s loss.

Nancy will be with us until the end of the year – until then it’s business as usual.  From January 2019 Nancy will continue to have a close association with OHE via an honorary role as an OHE Senior Visiting Fellow. We look forward to opportunities to continue working with Nancy and to collaborate with her new colleagues in Melbourne.

Nancy is President Elect of ISPOR, the leading global professional society for health economics and outcomes research (HEOR). She will be undertaking her term as President from her new position at the University of Melbourne, as well as continuing her active involvement with the EuroQol Group and to be actively involved in OHE’s research.

OHE has engaged an executive search agency to recruit Nancy’s replacement to join OHE’s leadership team. Nancy will be working with them to help find her successor.

*The University of Melbourne: Established in 1853, the University of Melbourne is a public-spirited institution that makes distinctive contributions to society in research, learning and teaching and engagement. It is consistently ranked among the leading universities in the world, with international rankings of world universities placing it as number 1 in Australia and number 32 in the world (Times Higher Education World University Rankings 2017-2018).