About Us
Our Senior Management Team
Prof. Michael Barry
Dr. Lesley Tilson
Dr. Roisin Adams
Dr. Laura McCullagh
Prof. Michael Barry is a Consultant Clinical Pharmacologist and Head of the Department of Pharmacology & Therapeutics at the University of Dublin, Trinity College. He is the clinical director of the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics which conducts pharmacoeconomic evaluations on medicines prior to reimbursement under the Community Drugs schemes in Ireland. He is Past-President (2010-2011) of the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research (ISPOR). He was a board member of the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) and is a member of a number of National Committees on pricing and reimbursement of medicines. Prof. Barry chairs the New Drugs Committee and the Medication Safety Committee at St. James’s Hospital, Dublin. In 2013 he was appointed as Clinical Lead for the new HSE Medicines Management Programme. He is a fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in Ireland and is a specialty trainer for Pharmacology & Therapeutics. His research areas include the cost-effectiveness of high cost drugs including chemotherapeutic agents and biologic drugs, pricing and reimbursement and performance based risk sharing schemes. He has published widely on the cost-effectiveness of medicines in the Irish healthcare setting. Email: [email protected]
Email: [email protected]
Dr. Lesley Tilson is Chief I Pharmacist at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics and is a graduate of the University of Brighton. She trained in the Chelsea and Westminster hospital, London and then worked as a resident pharmacist at the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust. During this time she completed a Diploma in Clinical Pharmacy with Cardiff University. Lesley worked as a senior clinical pharmacist at St James’s Hospital Dublin, on the intensive care unit and cardiac surgery ward. She has a PhD from the Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Trinity College Dublin (2002-2005) and a Diploma in Statistics from Trinity College Dublin (2003-2004). She is a lecturer in pharmacoeconomics to undergraduate and postgraduate pharmacy students. Research interests include: Economic evaluation of pharmaceuticals in the Irish setting, pharmaceutical pricing and reimbursement strategies, policies to promote generic markets, international pharmaceutical pricing, analysis of drug utilisation and expenditure trends. She received the ISPOR Bernie O’Brien New Investigator Award in May 2011.
Email: [email protected]
Dr. Roisin Adams is Head of HTA Strategy and External Engagement for the NCPE. Dr. Adams led the HTA team for a number of years before being seconded to the HSE to lead a new unit tasked with overseeing and managing high cost drugs in acute hospitals. Dr. Adams is the elected Chair of the Health Technology Assessment Coordination Group which is the governance body responsible for the EU HTA Regulation. She also co- chairs the HTA domain of the BeNeLuxA initiative and is a Director on the Board of the International Horizon Scanning Initiative. She has been awarded a number of grants from the Health Research Board to examine health preferences in Ireland. Her areas of interest include methods for preference elicitation, combining different data for evidence synthesis and reimbursement mechanisms for high cost drugs. She has held advisory positions for Department of Health, the Health Information and Quality Authority and policy direction at EU level.
Email: [email protected]
Email: [email protected]
Dr Laura McCullagh is Chief I Pharmacist & Head of Research, NCPE and Clinical Senior Lecturer, Trinity College Dublin. She holds a PhD, Trinity College Dublin and is a graduate of the Sunderland School of Pharmacy, UK (First-Class Hons). She represents Ireland on the EC HTA Coordination Group (medicinal products). She publishes research in international, peer-reviewed journals. She is a member of Cochrane. She is on the Editorial Boards of PharmacoEconomics and Frontiers in Medicine. She provides peer-review for heath-economics and clinical journals, for the Medical Research Council, UK and ZONMW (The Netherlands Organisation for Health Research and Development). She is on the ISPOR Europe Research Programme Committee. She is on the REC, Centre for Health Policy and Management and the Board of Management & Court of Examiners, MSc Pharm Med, Trinity College Dublin. She supervises post-doctoral, PhD, MD, MSc and undergraduate researchers. She is internal examiner for PhD and MSc research. She leads the HTA Module of the annual National Patient Education Programme (in collaboration with IPPOSI). She is a member of the National Cancer Epi Network. She was a member of the Pan-European Piperska Group (2013-2017). She was a member of the National Prostate Cancer Research Consortium (2014-2015). She has attended Expert Advisory Groups, HIQA. She was a member of the National Cancer Control Programme Technology Review Committee (2015-2018). Orchid ID:0000-0001-8342-8739
Email: [email protected]
The NCPE Review Group
Dr. Niamh Carey
Heather Eames
Cliona Flynn
Dr. Emer Fogarty
Niamh Geraghty
Marie Harte
Dr. Belinda Hernández
Dr. Felicity Lamrock
Dr. Joy Leahy
Alissa Looby
Orla Maguire
Natalia Maraeva
Dr. David McConnell
Caitríona Ní Choitir
Oanh Ngoc Nguyen
Joan O’Callaghan
Dr. Aisling O’Leary
Dr. Sinéad O’Neill
Dr. Lea Trela-Larsen
Dr. Cara Usher
Dr. Caroline Walsh
Prof. Cathal Walsh
Dr. Arthur White
Dr. Niamh Carey BSc (Pharm), MPharm, MSc (Health Economics), PhD
Dr. Niamh Carey is a Senior Health Technology Assessor at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics (NCPE), Ireland. In this role, Niamh is a lead for health technology assessment (HTA) appraisals. She is also involved in various teaching and research commitments. Niamh is a representative on the EU HTA Regulation Coordination Subgroup for Joint Scientific Consultation, and has been involved in producing several deliverables as part of the EUnetHTA 21 consortium. She is a graduate of the School of Pharmacy, Trinity College Dublin (TCD), and also holds a Masters of Pharmacy degree from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI). She joined the NCPE upon completion of a Masters in Health Economics at the National University of Ireland Galway (NUIG). In 2022, Niamh was awarded a PhD, from TCD, for her thesis entitled ‘Health Technology Assessment of CD19 CAR T-Cell Therapies in the Irish Healthcare Setting’. This research, conducted at the NCPE, examined several areas including expert elicitation methodology, value of information analysis, and risk-sharing agreements.
Email: [email protected]
Heather Eames is a Health Technology Assessor at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. She is a graduate of the Masters of Pharmacy programme from the School of Pharmacy, University College Cork. Her previous experience is in community pharmacy, research and industry settings. Heather subsequently completed a Masters in Health Economics through the National University of Ireland, Galway. Prior to joining the NCPE, she worked as a Health Technology Assessor for the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA). Heather is a former secretary and founding member of University College Cork’s ISPOR student chapter.
Email: [email protected]
Cliona is an information specialist at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. She graduated from Ulster University with a BSc Hons in Human Nutrition and a Diploma in Industrial Studies. She is currently completing her MSc in Epidemiology with the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. Prior to her appointment at the NCPE, Cliona worked with the Northern Ireland Statistics & Research Agency producing official statistics and social research and with the Calgary Health Region on a large systematic review examining best practice for the prevention and treatment of childhood obesity. Other work included research with Ulster University, University College Dublin and the Food Safety Authority of Ireland.
Email: [email protected]
Dr. Emer Fogarty is the NCPE Lead on HTA Methods and Guidelines. Emer holds a PhD in pharmacoeconomics from Trinity College, Dublin, having previously graduated with a BSc (Pharm) from Trinity College, and an MSc in Clinical Pharmacy from University College, Cork. Formerly employed as a clinical pharmacist in St. James’s Hospital, Emer worked in numerous clinical pharmacy specialities including general medicine, oncology, and infectious diseases. Emer represents Ireland on the EU HTA Committee and the Joint Clinical Assessment Subgroup of the EU Coordination Group on HTA. Emer’s research interests lie in the selection and application of methods in HTA and cost-effectiveness modelling.
mail: [email protected]
Niamh is the office administrator for the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. She completed a computer/receptionist course in Crumlin College of Business and Technical studies in 1989. Prior to starting in St. James’s Hospital in 1996 Niamh had been working for a private orthodontist for six years. Since joining St. James’s Hospital she has worked in various different departments including the Central Pathology Laboratory and Personnel (Human Resources). She also spent time working with the National Medicines Information Centre before joining the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics (NCPE) in 2000.
Email: [email protected]
Marie Harte is an information specialist at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. She graduated from Manchester Metropolitan University with a BSc Hons in Human Nutrition and subsequently completed the Master of Public Health (MPH) programme at University College Dublin. Marie previously worked as a senior horizon analyst at the Horizon Scanning Research and Intelligence Centre at the University of Birmingham. Marie has also worked at the Irish Research Council and the Health Research Board.
Email: [email protected]
Dr Belinda Hernández is a senior statistician at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. Previous to this she was a senior research fellow and lead bio-informatician for TILDA (The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing) in Trinity College Dublin (2017-2024) and Assistant Professor in statistics in the School of Mathematics and Statistics, University College Dublin (2015-2017). She holds a PhD in “Statistical Machine Learning” from University College Dublin as well as an MSc in “Applied Statistics” from the University of Oxford and a BAMod in “Management Science and Information Systems” from Trinity College Dublin.
She is a multidisciplinary researcher and has published research in areas such as multimorbidity; the development of molecular biomarkers for various chronic diseases and healthy ageing outcomes as well as in areas such as neuro-cardiovascular instability, multisensory integration, frailty and cognition. Her current research interests are focused on decision modelling in health technology assessments.
Dr. Felicity Lamrock is a Lecturer in Data Analytics at Queen’s University Belfast. She was previously a full-time statistician at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics before taking up her current post. Felicity completed her PhD in Medical Statistics from Queen’s University Belfast in 2016 which involved developing new statistical methodology and creating a model to test the cost-effectiveness of a panel of novel biomarkers to prevent cardiovascular disease. Felicity is also an Adjunct Researcher at the Institute for Public Health, Medical Decision Making and HTA at the University for Health Sciences Informatics and Technology (UMIT), Austria. Felicity is now a statistical advisor to the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics on statistical methodology for Health Technology Assessment. Research interests include combining the areas of statistics, decision modelling, pharmacoeconomics and data analytics. Her current work involves exploring how Northern Ireland could benefit from more decision modelling/pharmacoeocnomic assessment.
Email: [email protected]
Dr Joy Leahy is a statistician at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. She is a graduate of Mathematics and Statistics from University College Cork and holds a PhD in statistics from Trinity College Dublin (TCD). Her research interests include Bayesian methods for evidence synthesis and Network Meta-Analysis (NMA), with particular focus on the appropriate use of lesser quality evidence. She has worked on applications of these methods to disease networks such as Hepatitis C, melanoma and multiple myeloma. She was previously employed as a research assistant in the National University of Ireland, Galway, where she worked on an NMA comparing pharmaceutical and behavioural interventions for hypertension. She is a statistical ambassador with the Royal Statistical Society and was the 2017/2018 TCD student chapter president for the International Society for Pharmacoeconomics and Outcomes Research.
Alissa Looby is a Health Technology Assessor at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics (NCPE), Ireland. She is a graduate of the School of Pharmacy, University College Cork (UCC), and also holds a Masters of Pharmacy degree from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI). Alissa subsequently completed a Master of Science in Health Economics with University of York, United Kingdom. Prior to joining the NCPE, Alissa worked as a Research consultant within the Health Economics and Outcomes Research Team of a consultancy firm. BPharm, MPharm, MSc (Health Economics)
Email: [email protected]
Orla is a pharmacist and Senior Health Technology Assessor at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. She graduated from Queens University Belfast and subsequently completed an M.Sc. in Hospital Pharmacy from Trinity College, Dublin. Prior to her appointment to the NCPE, Orla was employed as senior clinical pharmacist in St James’s Hospital, Dublin. During that time, she worked in various clinical specialities and also occupied the roles of procurement pharmacist, editor to the SJH Prescriber’s Guide and secretary to the SJH New Drugs Committee. Her most extensive experience is within the critical care setting where she occupied the role of ICU pharmacist for more than 5 years.
Email: [email protected]
Natalia is a Programme Manager at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics (NCPE) Ireland, where she works on international collaborations, particularly in the context of the EU HTA Regulation. She holds an MPhil in Health Economics, Policy, and Management from the University of Oslo, Norway, and an MSc in Public Health from the University of Limerick. Natalia is also a Certified Associate in Project Management (CAPM) and has experience in non-profit, state, and commercial healthcare settings.
[email protected]
Dr. David McConnell is a Statistician at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics (NCPE). David holds a PhD in mathematics from Trinity College Dublin and previously held lectureships at the University of Glasgow and Cardiff University. He joined the NCPE in 2019. His role involves evaluating statistical aspects of clinical trials, evidence synthesis and economic modelling in health technology assessments, as well conducting research and developing guidelines in these areas. He is actively involved in joint HTA work at a European level via the Methodology Subgroup of the HTA Coordination Group, and made significant contributions to the EUnetHTA21 methodological guidelines and Joint Scientific Consultations.
Email: [email protected]
Caitríona Ní Choitir is a Senior Research Fellow at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. A member of the NCPE review group team, Caitríona is also the national clinical data manager for the Irish Hepatitis C Treatment Registry. She holds a Masters in Pharmacy degree from the Robert Gordon University of Aberdeen and an MSc in International Health Policy and Health Economics from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Prior to joining the NCPE, Caitríona worked as a data analytics and service improvement consultant in the NHS and as a senior health economics and outcomes research consultant in the pharmaceutical industry. Caitríona is presently a member of the Council of Clinical Information Officers, eHealth Ireland. Research interests include; pharmaceutical economics and policy, outcomes research and methods for the economic evaluation of technologies and health care.
Email: [email protected]
Oanh Ngoc Nguyen is a Health Technology Assessor at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics (NCPE) Ireland. She completed her Bachelor of Pharmacy in Vietnam and later graduated with a Master of Public Health from University College Dublin. Before joining the NCPE, Oanh worked as a pharmacist in an international hospital in Vietnam. During that time, she gained various experiences in clinical practice, including internal medicine, oncology, and cardiology.
Email: [email protected]
Joan O’Callaghan is a Senior Health Technology Assessor and Lead on Patient and Public Involvement at the NCPE. She is a graduate of the School of Pharmacy, Trinity College Dublin. Upon completion of her degree she completed her pre-registration training at St. James’s Hospital, Dublin. Joan subsequently worked as a pharmacist in the hospital and community settings. Prior to taking up her current position Joan worked at the Health Products Regulatory Authority (HPRA) as both a Pharmaceutical Assessor and a Research Scientist. Her research in the HPRA focused on the use of biosimilar medicines. Joan holds a Masters by Research from University College Cork and a MSc. in Biopharmaceutical Science from IT Sligo. Joan’s current research interests include stakeholder involvement in health technology assessment.
Email: [email protected]
Dr. O’Leary MPSI, a graduate of the School of Pharmacy, Dublin University, Trinity College with a Ph.D in pharmaceutical chemistry, is a Chief II pharmacist in the centre. Her background is predominantly in hospital pharmacy where she worked in a variety of clinical disciplines including GUIDE, endocrinology, rheumatology and dermatology. She co-ordinated the M.Sc. in Hospital Pharmacy from 1995 to 2005 under the auspices of TCD. She retains an academic teaching role with the School of Pharmacy, RCSI where she is Programme Director of Studies of the National Pharmacy Internship Programme. She is a member of the Irish Medication Safety Network, the Hospital Pharmacists Association of Ireland and the 2012 Hospital Pharmacy Assessment Group (PSI). Since 2005 she has been involved in the appraisal of the cost-effectiveness of new technologies for the centre.
Email: [email protected]
Dr. Sinéad O’Neill is a Senior Health Technology Assessor at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. She is a graduate of the BSc in Public Health (2008) from the School of Epidemiology and Public Health, University College Cork (UCC) and holds a Master in Public Health [Advanced Epidemiology and Biostatistics] also from UCC (2009). In October 2010, she was awarded a Health Research Board Ireland scholarship and joined the SPHeRE PhD programme in Health Services Research, based in the National Perinatal Epidemiology Centre (NPEC) in Cork University Maternity Hospital. She was awarded a PhD from UCC in June 2014 for her thesis entitled ‘Caesarean section delivery and subsequent subfertility – a Danish register-based cohort study’. Subsequently Sinéad worked as a Post-Doctoral Fellow in the Irish Centre for Fetal and Neonatal Translational Research (INFANT) from 2010-2014 where she was awarded a HRB-funded Cochrane Fellowship to complete a Cochrane review entitled ‘Different insulin types and regimens for pregnant women with pre-existing type 1 diabetes’. She also lectured on the BSc and MPH programmes in the School of Epidemiology and Public Health, UCC and completed a PG Certificate (2015) and PG Diploma (2017) in Teaching and Learning for Higher Education in UCC. Sinéad then worked in the Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) as a Health Services Researcher/Epidemiologist within the HTA Directorate from 2017-2021. She was awarded a prestigious Naji Foundation Scholarship to complete an MSc in Evidence-Based Health Care at the University of Oxford (2021-2024), where her dissertation investigated the safety and efficacy of JAK inhibitors in adults with rheumatoid arthritis, in the form of a systematic review and cumulative meta-analysis. Her research interests include systematic literature reviews, meta-analysis and evidence-based methodologies to inform HTAs.
Email: [email protected]
Lea Trela-Larsen is a senior statistician at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics (NCPE). She completed a Mathematics BSc Hons and a PhD in Epidemiology and Statistics both at University of Bristol. She has previously worked as an analyst with the UK Government Statistical Service and as a senior research associate at University of Bristol working with National Joint Registry for England, Wales, Northern Ireland and the Isle of Man. Prior to taking up her current position Lea was a post-doctoral researcher at University of Limerick and worked with the NCPE on a project examining stakeholder requirements for real-world drug utilisation evidence. Research interests include survival analysis, and use of administrative and secondary data.
Email: [email protected]
Dr. Cara Usher is Senior Research Fellow at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. Dr. Cara Usher is Senior Research Fellow at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. She holds a PhD (Pharmacology) from University College Dublin and a post-graduate diploma in Health Economics from the University of York. Overall her work has focused on evaluation of healthcare technologies, education about the evaluation process and examining the effects of reimbursement decisions through a national primary care prescription database. Her research interests include analysis of pharmaceutical policy interventions and their impact on prescribing in the community. She holds a new investigator award from the International society for pharmacoeconomics and outcomes research (ISPOR, 2008) and is a visiting research fellow at Trinity College Dublin.
Email: [email protected]
Dr Caroline Walsh is a Senior Health Technology Assessor at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics. She is a graduate of the School of Pharmacy, Trinity College Dublin and holds a Masters in Pharmacy degree from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI). Caroline completed her pre-registration training in the pharmacy department at Tallaght University Hospital (TUH). After qualifying as a pharmacist, she worked for one year as a hospital pharmacist in TUH, mainly on the oncology service and in the aseptic compounding unit. In September 2016, she joined the SPHeRE PhD programme as a RCSI PhD scholar under the supervision of Prof Kathleen Bennett and Dr Caitriona Cahir. Funded by a Health Research Board Research Leader Award, she was awarded a PhD from RCSI in November 2020 for her thesis entitled ‘The association between medication adherence across multiple medications and health outcomes in ageing populations’. Caroline is a former co-chair and chair of the student council of the International Society for Pharmacoepidemiology. She was previously president of the RCSI ISPOR student chapter. Research interests include pharmacoeconomic evaluation and the use of real world data in health technology assessment.
Email: [email protected]
Prof. Cathal Walsh is the Professor of Biostatistics in the School of Medicine at Trinity College Dublin, having previously been Chair in the Mathematics and Statistics department at the University of Limerick and a HRB Research Leader in Health Decision Science. He has held visiting appointments in Bayesian groups in Australia and the United States. His research interests are in evidence synthesis and disease modelling, and he was part of the Irish Epidemiological Modelling Advisory Group, working within the Health Protection Surveillance Centre during the COVID-19 pandemic. He has been an advisor to the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics on statistical methodology for Health Technology Assessment for over 15 years.
Email: [email protected]
Dr. Arthur White is a statistician at the National Centre for Pharmacoeconomics,and an Assistant Professor in the discipline of Statistics in the School of Computer Science and Statistics in Trinity College Dublin. Arthur is a Mathematics graduate of Trinity College Dublin, receiving his degree in 2009. He holds a PhD from the School of Mathematics and Statistics in University College Dublin, for research into latent variable models for multivariate and network data. This work was undertaken as a member of Clique, an SFI funded strategic research cluster. He was previously a postdoctoral researcher for the HRB funded Centre for Health Decision Science. His research interests include Bayesian methods for calibration, model selection and model averaging, and model-based clustering methods. He has worked on applications related to hepatitis C and melanoma, and investigated health service usage patterns among the Irish frail elderly population.
Email: [email protected]
