Members of the Kirkham Neuro Lab

Professor Kirkham trained as a Paediatric Neurologist and has been Professor at UCL Institute of Child Health since 2006. She held an honorary clinical post at Great Ormond Street hospital until 1999 when she moved to Southampton University Hospitals Trust as a consultant paediatric neurologist. She has developed services for children with epilepsy and developed screening for stroke risk in sickle cell disease in the UK. Professor Kirkham has collaborated with the UK, North American and European paediatric neurologists, haematologists and respiratory physicians on guidelines.

Professor Kirkham has published over 500 peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, and reports on childhood stroke, coma, complex epilepsy, and sickle cell disease. She has been the principal investigator on multiple randomised controlled trials. She was also the Chief Investigator for the London site on two international collaborative studies.

 

 

Sati has presented at various national and international meetings and co-authored peer-reviewed articles in high impact journals.

She completed her Clinical Psychology internship at Children’s Minnesota and a one-year fellowship with Dr Lori Crosby as a Sickle Cell Disease Postdoctoral Fellow in the Division of Behavioral Medicine and Clinical Psychology at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. She is the recipient of pre-doctoral (F31) and postdoctoral (F32) training grants from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) at the National Institutes of Health to fund research focused on the cognitive and psychological challenges faced by children and young adults with sickle cell disease.

Dr Hood has given presentations at regional and national meetings and authored or co-authored peer-reviewed articles, book chapters, and community-focused reports. Dr Hood has also worked clinically with adult and paediatric populations focused on assessment and health psychology.

She is currently completing a PhD under the supervision of Professor Fenella Kirkham, Professor Christopher Clark and Dr Dagmara Dimitrou. Her current research focus is on understanding sleep behaviour and habits in sickle cell anaemia. Her methods include polysomnography to measure obstruction of airflow during sleep; an Actiwatch to measure sleep duration and fragmentation; collecting cortisol saliva samples during the day and assessing cognitive abilities and neuroimaging to understand structural and functional changes. She hopes to design interventions and treatment opportunities in the future.

She is the recipient of the BRC Doctoral Training Support Fund, the European Sleep Research Society Training Grant and won the UCL Grand Challenges to develop a novel spatial memory test for children. Melanie won the SLC Research Student Award at the International Neuropsychological Society Meeting in Cape Town (2017).

Melanie has given presentations at regional and national meetings. She authored and co-authored peer-reviewed articles and is active in teaching. Melanie has also worked with paediatric populations focused on education and health psychology.