Transforming Disease Monitoring in the Era of Home Diagnostics (LAKEI_U26ENVNIHR)
Key details
- Application deadline
- 29 July 2026 (23.59 UK time)
- Location
- UEA
- Funding type
- Directly funded project (Home students only)
- Start date
- 1 October 2026
- Mode of study
- Full-time
- Programme type
- PhD
)
Welcome to Norwich
According to the Sunday Times, this city is one of the best places to live in the UK.
Project description
Primary Supervisor - Professor Ian Lake
Project Overview
Gastrointestinal (GI) infections remain a major public health challenge in the United Kingdom and worldwide. Robust monitoring is essential for detecting outbreaks, tackling trends and informing timely interventions. Traditionally, this has relied on laboratory testing following referral of samples by general practitioners and hospital clinicians. For every single case diagnosed and reported to national surveillance in this way, there are nearly 150 community cases occurring under the public health radar.
A major shift is underway. The rapid growth of at-home diagnostic kits by-passes the bottleneck of conventional face-to-face appointments by enabling individuals to test for infections outside conventional healthcare services. These technologies are generating new, potentially valuable data streams but their role in public health monitoring remains largely unexplored.
This PhD offers a rare opportunity to study this transformation as it unfolds, and to explore the hidden burden of GI infections. You will investigate whether data from home diagnostics can enhance monitoring systems, expose the submerged portion of the disease iceberg, and reshape how infectious diseases are monitored in the future.
Aims and Methods
This interdisciplinary project sits at the intersection of public health, microbiology and social science addressing the question:
Can home diagnostic testing meaningfully improve monitoring of gastrointestinal infections?
The project will be tailored to your interests, likely including:
Technology and market analysis: evaluating available home diagnostic kits, including pathogens detected and technologies used.
Understanding users and behaviours: conducting social science research (e.g. surveys or interviews) to understand who uses these tests and how this influences the data produced.
Public health integration: analysing whether and how these data could support existing monitoring. including identifying biases and data gaps.
The project will deliver a forward-looking framework to support the integration of home diagnostic data into public health monitoring.
Training and Development
You will join a collaborative and interdisciplinary research environment, working alongside experts in public health, microbiology and social science. You will gain skills in:
Advanced evidence synthesis
Quantitative analysis of large health datasets
Social science methods
Translating data into actionable public health insights
These highly transferable skills are in strong demand across academic, government and industry.
Entry Requirements
We seek a motivated and curious individual with an interest in public health and data-driven research.
Essential:
• A first or upper second-class degree (or equivalent) in a relevant subject
Desirable (not required):
• Interest or background in public health, microbiology or social science
Why apply?
This is project offers the opportunity to work on a fast-evolving policy-relevant challenge with real world impact. You will help define how emerging health technologies shape the future of disease monitoring in the UK and worldwide.
Entry requirements
A first or upper second-class degree (or equivalent) in a relevant subject.
Funding
This 3-year PhD project is fully funded by the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) and open to UK applicants only. The successful candidate will receive home tuition fees, an annual tax-free maintenance stipend and £1,000 per annum to support research training.
References
i) Rowland BW, Sexton V, Mill A, Rushton S, Sanderson R, Grundy C, de Lusignan S, Cunliffe NA, Hungerford D, Hopkins M, Gharbia S, Jenkins C, Godbole G, Vivancos R, Elliot AJ, Mellor DJ, Larkin L, Chalmers R, O'Brien S, IID3 Consortium. The Third Study of Infectious Intestinal Disease (IID3 Study) in the Community: Protocol for UK-Based Prospective Cohort Studies Investigating the Disease Burden. JMIR Res Protoc 2026;15:e88759
ii) Elson R, Grace K, Vivancos R, Jenkins C, Adak GK, O’Brien SJ, Lake IR (2018). A spatial and temporal analysis of risk factors associated with sporadic Shiga toxinproducing Escherichia coli O157 infection in England between 2009 and 2015. Epidemiology and Infection 146, 1928–1939. https://doi.org/10.1017/S095026881800256X
iii) Bien-Gund, C., Dugosh, K., et al. (2021) 'Factors Associated With US Public Motivation to Use and Distribute COVID-19 Self-tests', JAMA Network Open, 4(1), p. e2034001. Available at: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2775297
iv) Ahmed, S. A., et al. "An Overview of the Molecular Methods in the Diagnosis of Gastrointestinal Infectious Diseases." International Journal of Microbiology, vol. 2020, Article ID 7526012, 2020