Mursheda Begum

Email: mursheda.begum@qmul.ac.uk

Project title

Profiling the professions by ethnicity and sex, and ways to improve their representativeness.

Project description

This study explores gender and ethnic diversity within two healthcare professions in the UK: speech and language therapy and medical radiography. A tripartite framework is used to explore diversity management within the professions:

1. discourses: how diversity policies and strategies are talked about in these professions (i.e. approaches/motivations for pursuing diversity),
2. practices and diversity practitioners: how it is practiced and who the main people involved are, and
3. lived experiences: if or how these policies and one’s sex and ethnicity shape the lived experiences of these healthcare professionals (i.e. impact on workplace experiences and career trajectories).

Thus, the study aims to address the following three research questions:

• What discourses underlie the sex and ethnicity diversity policies/initiatives of the chosen healthcare professions in the UK?
• What do sex and ethnic diversity policies/initiatives in the chosen professions look like in practice? Who are the key actors and why are they considered key actors?
• Do diversity policies & practices shape professional's lived experiences related to sex and ethnicity in the chosen healthcare professions, and if so, how?

Participants are diversity practitioners (individuals driving the diversity agenda within the profession) and practising healthcare professionals (therapists and radiographers), who will be recruited from organisations (e.g. NHS and private firms) that employ the latter group, using purposive and snowballing techniques. If time permits, the perspectives of relevant non-profit organisations such as professional associations may be sought. Two data collection methods will be used in this cross-sectional study: (a) analysis of the organisation’s diversity policy documents and (b) semi-structured interviews with diversity practitioners and practising healthcare professionals. Diversity practitioner interviews will explore how diversity policies/strategies are practiced: why diversity is pursued, contents of policy (e.g. goals), its implementation (i.e. obstacles/opportunities), outcomes and who the main people are throughout the process. Practising healthcare professional interviews will explore career experiences related to diversity (e.g. any obstacles/sources of support, how sex/ethnicity made a difference to accessing/ progressing within careers, if their employer’s diversity policies had any impact on their careers). Interviews will be conducted either virtually or face-to-face, audio or video-recorded, with some notes also taken, and then transcribed. Thematic analysis using NVivo software will be used to analyse the interviews.

Supervision

1^st Supervisor: Dr Elena Doldor, Queen Mary University of London
2^nd Supervisor: Dr Grant Lewison, King’s College London
3^rd Supervisor: Dr Doyin Atewologun, Oxford University

Biography

Mursheda studied BSc (Hons) Psychology and MSc Health Psychology at University College London. Before starting her PhD, she worked as a Research Assistant on the European Commission’s “Mapping_NCD” project (2014-17, https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/602536) which mapped five non-communicable disease research across Europe, and has also conducted bibliometric health research for Evaluametrics Ltd.

• LinkedIn

Publications

• Begum M, Urquhart I, Lewison G, Fouad F & Sullivan R (2020). Research on lung cancer and its funding, 2004–2018. ecancer, 14, 1132. doi:  https://doi.org/10.3332/ecancer.2020.1132
• Pallari E, Begum M, Aggarwal A & Lewison G (2020). Prostate cancer research, 2000-16, its citation impact and its influence on clinical practice guidelines. Journal of Scientometric Research, 9(1):11-18.
• Baig S, Nicolaou SA, Lawrence D, Myers J & Begum M (2020). Student learning about UK health services in a crossborder curriculum partnership; the London-Cyprus experience. MedEdPublish, 9(1), 58, https://doi.org/10.15694/mep.2020.000058.1
• Begum M, Lewison G, Wölbert E, Brigham KB, Darlington M, Durand-Zaleski I, Sullivan R (2020). Mental health disorders research in Europe, 2001–2018. Evidence-Based Mental Health, 23(1), 15-20. http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/ebmental-2019-300130
• Begum M, Lewison G, Lawler M & Sullivan R. (Oct 2018). The value of European immigration for high-level UK research and clinical care: cross-sectional study. Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, 112(1), 29-35. doi: 10.1177/0141076818803427. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6348557/pdf/10.1177_0141076818803427.pdf
• Lawler M, Begum M, Lewison G, Aggarwal A, Selby P & Sullivan R. (Oct 2018). Comment: The impact of Brexit on UK cancer research. The Lancet Oncology, 19(10), P1276-1278. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/S1470-2045(18)30518-7. https://www.thelancet.com/action/showPdf?pii=S1470-2045%2818%2930518-7.
• Begum M, Lewison G, Jassem J, Mixich V, Cufer T, Nurgozhin T, Shabalkin P, Kutluk T, Voko Z, Radosavljevic D, Vrdoljiak E, Eniu A, Walewski J, Aggarwal A, Lawler M & Sullivan R. (Oct 2018). Mapping cancer research across Central and Eastern Europe, the Russian Federation and Central Asia: Implications for future national cancer control planning. European Journal of Cancer, 104:127-136. doi: 10.1016/j.ejca.2018.08.024. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959804918313534?via%3Dihub
•  [Press article on paper: Immigration restrictions for eu citizens could damage uk research and healthcare environment post-brexit (11^th Oct 2018): https://www.rsm.ac.uk/about-us/media-information/2018-media-releases/immigration-restrictions-for-eu-citizens-could-damage-uk-research-and-healthcare-environment-post-brexit.aspx]
• Begum M, Lewison G, Lawler M & Sullivan R. (Sept 2018). Mapping the European cancer research landscape: An evidence base for national and pan-European research and funding. European Journal of Cancer, 100, 75-84. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejca.2018.04.017. https://www.ejcancer.com/article/S0959-8049(18)30818-9/pdf
• Pallari E, Lewison G, Pallari C, Samoutis G, Begum M & Sullivan R. (Aug 2018). The contribution of Cyprus to non-communicable diseases and biomedical research from 2002 to 2013: implications for evidence-based health policy. Health Research Policy and Systems, 16:82. doi: https://doi.org/10.1186/s12961-018-0355-4. https://health-policy-systems.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf/10.1186/s12961-018-0355-4.
• Pallari E, Lewison G, Ciani O, Tarricone R, Sommariva S, Begum M & Sullivan R. (July 2018). The impacts of diabetes research from 31 European Countries in 2002 to 2013. Research Evaluation, 27(3): 270-282. doi: https://doi.org/10.1093/reseval/rvy006. https://academic.oup.com/rev/article/27/3/270/4969899.
• Begum M, Lewison G, Sommariva S, Ciani O, Tarricone R & Sullivan R. (Oct 2017). European diabetes research and its funding, 2002–2013. Diabetic Medicine, 34(10):1354-1360. doi: 10.1111/dme.13411.         https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/dme.13411.
• Lewison G, Roe P, Begum M & Sullivan R. (Sept 2017). Web of science research funding information: Methodology for its use in analysis and evaluation. Journal of Scientometric Research, 6(2), 65-73. doi:10.5530/jscires.6.2.12.BibTex. http://www.jscires.org/sites/default/files/JScientometRes-6-2-65_0.pdf
• 2016
• Begum M, Pallari E & Lewison G. (Nov 2016). European cancer research: From bench to bedside and to breakfast table. Ecancermedicalscience, 10 (ed60). doi:10.3332/ecancer.2016.ed60. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5130326/pdf/can-10-ed60.pdf
• [Short article on editorial: http://ecancer.org/journal/news/10419-european-cancer-research--from-bench-to-bedside-and-to-breakfast-table.php]
• Begum M, Lewison G, Wright JSF, Pallari E & Sullivan R. (April 2016). European non-communicable respiratory disease research, 2002-13: Bibliometric study of outputs and funding. PLoS ONE, 11(4): e0154197. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0154197. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0154197

Conference presentations

• Begum, M., Roe, P., Webber, R. & Lewison, G. (2017). UK Ethnic Minority Cancer Researchers: Their Origins, Destinations and Sex. (Presented at ISSI 2017)
• Begum, M., Roe, P., Webber, R., Lewison, G. & Sullivan, R. (2016). The Virtues (or Otherwise) of Immigrant Scientists. (Presented at COLLNET 2016)
• Begum, M. & Lewison, G. (2014). European Cancer Research Publications, 2002–13. (Presented at COLLNET 2014)