Mike Catchpole

Professor Mike Catchpole of the Health Protection Agency is lead for work-stream 3, “infection surveillance” along with Alison Holmes and Paul Aylin both from Imperial College London. The research in this work-stream focuses specifically on using existing databases in the NHS, Health Protection Agency and elsewhere to their fullest potential to improve early warning and risk prediction in the Trust.  The novel uses of such existing local databases will enhance surveillance capability of healthcare associated infections at an organisational level, and help develop predictive models to identify individual at risk patients.

Mike and his colleagues from the HPA Centre for Infection add their experience in the development and use of sophisticated statistical, mathematical and bioinformatical approaches to that held at Imperial.  Research and development dedicated to infectious diseases aspects of public health is part of the HPA Centre's function and Mike and his team undertake epidemiological research and development on issues of communicable disease prevention and control, developing new surveillance tools, defining risk and evaluating effectiveness of interventions.

Background

Mike Catchpole is the Deputy Director of the Health Protection Agency’s Centre for Infections. He has worked in infectious disease epidemiology and response at national and international level since 1991, and is UK ‘State Epidemiologist’ on the Advisory Forum to the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) and chairs the Faculty of Public Health’s Information and Intelligence Committee.

He has over 15 years experience of management of national surveillance systems for infectious diseases in England and Wales, and leads the HPA’s surveillance strategy. He has coordinated many national infectious disease outbreak investigations, and led the HPA’s public health follow up of those exposed to the London bombings. He has also been a member of the steering groups for a number of European projects.