Supervisor View Full Details

Supervisor View 2
October 3, 2016
Supervisor View Full Details 2nd
October 12, 2016

Dr Suzanne Timmons

Department:Centre for Gerontology and Rehabilitation

Division:School of Medicine

Organisation:University College Cork

Webpage:https://www.ucc.ie/en/cgr; http://research.ucc.ie/profiles/C101/stimmons

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Research Fields
  • neuroscience and mental health
Postgrad Medical Specialites
  • Medicine
Medical Subspecialties
  • Dementia
  • Geriatric Medicine
My Work

The research of the Centre for Gerontology and Rehabilitation is focused on neurodegenerative diseases, particularly dementia and Parkinson?s disease (PD).
In dementia, a strong focus is health service research to improve dementia and delirium care in hospitals. Dr. Timmons was co-lead for the Irish National Audit of Dementia (INAD) and the Northern Ireland Audit of Dementia (NIAD) (see https://www.ucc.ie/en/inad/ ).
Other notable projects include:
The ?Cork Delirium Studies? (e.g. http://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/3/1/e001772.full; https://meta.science/paper/25359923_frequency_of_delirium_and_subsyndromal_delirium_in_an_adult_acute_hospital_population; http://jnnp.bmj.com/content/85/10/1122.full; https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/international-psychogeriatrics/article/concordance-between-the-delirium-motor-subtyping-scale-dmss-and-the-abbreviated-version-dmss-4-over-longitudinal-assessment-in-elderly-medical-inpatients/ABF5D566A7CC380D9C523CC1BC44B474);
the ?Cork Dementia Study? (http://ageing.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2015/09/28/ageing.afv131.full) and the ?Cork Integrated Dementia care Across Settings (Cork-IDEAS)? project.
We also are leading research into appropriate anti-psychotic prescribing, especially in long-term care settings: (http://www.lenus.ie/hse/handle/10147/620595; https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26976947), and dementia palliative care: (http://jgp.sagepub.com/content/early/2015/06/04/0891988715588835.abstract).

In PD, we are just completing a large project exploring palliative care needs, including national guidelines (https://www.ucc.ie/en/parkinsonscare/), and we are leading research into peripheral biomarkers of cell signalling abnormalities in PD (https://www.ucc.ie/en/pdrc/), as well as collaborating in PD gut microbiota studies.
We also are involved in several clinical trials, including the prevention of functional decline in hospitalised older people (APEP study), nutraceuticals to improve cognition, and food supplementation for frail older people in long-term care.
See also our social housing report (http://www.cluid.ie/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/A-HOME-FOR-LIFE-FINAL-28-10-15.pdf), led by Dr. Siobhan Fox, Postdoctoral researcher.

Potential Projects

Delirium is a hugely expanding research area ? under-detected, serious adverse outcomes, and one of the few reversible causes of dementia!! We have several ongoing studies in delirium detection and prevention and would be delighted to supervise a PhD student in a novel tool development or validation project, or in Health Service research or implementation research regarding existing guidelines and policies and their use (or lack of use) in clinical practice.
We also have several strands of dementia research and potential projects here include palliative care in dementia ? validating generic palliative care tools in dementia care; evaluating models of care; exploring ?comfort? in advanced dementia; or research in the area of dementia care in acute hospitals, especially integrated care pathways; or models of care for dementia in the community or in long-term care (especially in the area of medication prescribing).
In Parkinson?s disease, we plan to expand our current biomarker work, and can provide supervision for a laboratory-based student (through our collaborations with Biochemistry and Neuroanatomy departments here in UCC); or a clinical study on carers? needs and grief in PD, to build upon our research in the area of PD palliative care and our more recent focus on the needs of carers.
Finally, we are the Centre for Gerontology and Rehabilitation so we are very involved in research into physical activity and functional decline, exercise promotion in older people, and rehabilitation studies in older people.

We are highly involved at national level in Gerontology policy, programmes and education. We have research staff, MSc, doctoral and Postdoctoral students from Allied Health Profession disciplines, as well as Pharmacy, Psychology and of course Medicine, and collaborate with many other centres and institutions in Ireland and the UK, so students get the benefit of a vibrant, interdisciplinary and translation-focussed research team.