Staff profile: Dr Rachel Garrod
Position: Visiting Reader in Physiotherapy
School: Rehabilitation Sciences
Biography
Rachel graduated from Guy's Hospital School of Physiotherapy in 1991 and later worked at St Thomas’ Hospital and The Royal London Hospitals, specialising in respiratory and cardiac physiotherapy. In 1995 she joined The London Chest Hospital as a research physiotherapist, where she undertook an MSc in Health Sciences and developed a tool to assess dyspnoea during activities of daily living in people with COPD. This led to further research towards a PhD, and her PhD thesis: ‘Strategies to improve the effectiveness of pulmonary rehabilitation in patients with severe COPD’, has generated much published material.
Rachel joined the Faculty’s School of Rehabilitation Sciences in 2000. She is editor of ‘Pulmonary rehabilitation: An interdisciplinary approach’ and Chair of the Association of Chartered Physiotherapists in Respiratory Care. She sat on the guideline development panel for National Institute of Clinical Effectiveness (NICE) COPD guidelines and is a member of the British Thoracic Society and European Respiratory Society. She is deputy editor for Physiotherapy Research International and regularly contributes to international conferences as chair and speaker.
Presently she supervises a number of PhD and MSc students and is principal investigator for a number of research projects. She is co-chair of the Exercise Research in Inflammatory Conditions Group (ERIC), which supports a portfolio of research concerning exercise and its effects in a variety of inflammatory conditions, COPD, lung and breast cancer, and multiple myeloma. Other collaborative studies under the ERIC umbrella include the evaluation of psychological interventions aimed at increasing exercise adherence in COPD and assessment of cardiovascular risk in cystic fibrosis.
Interests
Management of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD); pulmonary rehabilitation programmes and programmes of exercise and education for patients with chronic disease process (recovering cancer patients and multiple myeloma patients); outcome measurement, evaluation of physiotherapy practices and oxygen usage.
Students supervised
