![Professor Gary Macfarlane Professor Gary Macfarlane](/img/200x200/staffpages/uploads/sme490/avatar/lNHmQ7aFXP5qvcdbhbzBeMKuX3gEeHXw3npkOzwG.jpeg)
BSc (Hons), MBChB, PhD, CStat, MD (Hons), FFPHM, DSc
Clinical Chair in Epidemiology
- About
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- Email Address
- g.j.macfarlane@abdn.ac.uk
- Office Address
- School/Department
- School of Medicine, Medical Sciences and Nutrition
Personal Assistant- Personal Assistant
- Mrs Jisha Babu
Biography
Gary Macfarlane has held the Chair in Epidemiology (Clinical) since 2005 and previously held the same post at The University of Manchester from 1999. He is an Honorary Consultant in the Department of Public Health at NHS Grampian, Deputy Clinical Lead for Chronic Pain at NHS Research Scotland and Director of the Versus Arthritis/Medical Research Council Centre for Musculoskeletal Health and Work. He was Dean of Research Impact and Interdisciplinary Research for the period 2018-2024. He trained in Statistics/ Computing Science and then Medicine at The University of Glasgow before undertaking his PhD at The University of Bristol. He worked at the Division of Epidemiology and Biostatistics at the European Institute of Oncology in Milan before leading a programme of chronic pain research at the Arthritis Research UK Epidemiology Unit at the University of Manchester.
He leads the Epidemiology group at the University of Aberdeen. The clinical research programme focusses on Rheumatic and Musculoskeletal Diseases (RMD) and undertakes research on: mechanisms of disease onset and outcome (observational epidemiology), identifying effective management for RMDs (Clinical trials and evidence synthesis), and designing optimal delivery of care (health services research). He and his research team have particular expertise in common complex conditions (including musculoskeletal pain and fatigue, fibromyalgia, and early osteoarthritis), inflammatory conditions, and rare diseases. The programme also hosts several disease and drug registries: the British Society of Rheumatology Biologics Registers in Ankylosing Spondylitis (BSRBR-AS) and Psoriatic Arthritis (BSR-PsA) and the British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy UK Antimicrobial Registry (UKAR), all of which recruit UK-wide. Professor Macfarlane is a Chartered Statistician of the Royal Statistical Society, a Fellow of the Faculty of Public Health Medicine and an Honorary fellow of the Faculty of Occupational Medicine.
Qualifications
- BSc (Hons) Statistics and Computing Science1985 - University of Glasgow
- MBChB Medicine and Surgery1990 - University of Glasgow
- PhD Epidemiology1993 - University of Bristol
The Epidemiology of Oral Cancer
- MD (Hons) Medicine (Epidemiology)2003 - University of Glasgow
- DSc Medicine2021 - University of Glasgow
- CStat Statistics1999 - Royal Statistical Society
- FFPH Public Health2009 - Faculty of Public Health
External Memberships
- Health and Safety Executive (UK) Scientific Quality Advisory Group: Member
- British Pain Society Annual Scientific Meeting Organising Committee: Member
- NHS Research Scotland Pain Network: Deputy Chair
- Versus Arthritis Fellowship Committee: Member
- British Society for Rheumatology: Research and Registers Committee
Latest Publications
Patients with Axial Spondyloarthritis Reported Willingness to Use Remote Care and Showed High Adherence to Electronic Patient-Reported Outcome Measures: An 18-Month Observational Study
Rheumatology InternationalContributions to Journals: ArticlesImpact of fatigue on work productivity and health-related job loss
Occupational MedicineContributions to Journals: ArticlesCut-Offs for Disease Activity States in Axial Spondyloarthritis With Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Score (ASDAS) Based on C-Reactive Protein and ASDAS Based on Erythrocyte Sedimentation Rate: Are they interchangeable?
The Journal of rheumatology, vol. 51, no. 7, pp. 673-677Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.3899/jrheum.2023-1217
Do current methods of measuring the impact of chronic pain on work reflect the experience of working-age adults?: An integrated mixed methods systematic narrative review
Pain, vol. 165, no. 7, pp. 1472-1481Contributions to Journals: ArticlesMeeting the care priorities of people with rheumatic and musculoskeletal conditions: priorities for action
Aberdeen: University of Aberdeen. 39 pagesBooks and Reports: Other Reports
Prizes and Awards
Sir Alexander Morison Medal from the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh
Heberden Medal from the British Society for Rheumatology
- Research
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Research Overview
My major research interests are in the Epidemiology of Rheumatic and Musculoskleletal Disorders (RMD) with a particular focus on common disabling symptoms (chronic pain, and fatigue) inflammatory and non-inflammatory arthritis. I am Director of the Versus Arthritis and MRC Centre for Musculoskeletal Health and Work. I lead several nationwide drug registries. I have current live grant income over £13 million.
Research Specialisms
- Epidemiology
- Medical Statistics
- Medicine
- Environmental and Public Health
Our research specialisms are based on the Higher Education Classification of Subjects (HECoS) which is HESA open data, published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence.
Research programme
You can read about the research programme I lead, including studies underway, research outputs and plain language summaries here: https://www.abdn.ac.uk/iahs/research/epidemiology/research-107.php
Collaborations
Medical Research Council/Arthritis Research UK Centre for Musculoskeletal Health and Work
Professor Macfarlane principal investigator for the Aberdeen spoke of this centre, which is based at the University of Southampton. Coordinated by the University of Southampton, the centre brings together fifteen different academic institutions across the UK, with interest and expertise in rheumatic and musculoskeletal disease, and its relation to occupation, to identify effective and cost-effective ways to minimise the adverse impacts of musculoskeletal disorders in the workplace. The work at the University of Aberdeen is focussed on investigating: media campaigns for low back pain; axial spondyloarthritis; pain management.
European League Against Rheumatism (EULAR) revised guidelines for the management of fibromyalgia
Professor Macfarlane chaired an international group of clinicians, allied health professionals and scientists from 12 countries across Europe, in revising EULAR guidelines for the management of fibromyalgia. Since the original EULAR fibromyalgia guidelines, more than fifty randomised controlled trials have been published concerned with the phramcological or non-pharmacological management of the conditions. The revised guidelines were published, in 2016, in the Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases: http://ard.bmj.com/content/early/2016/07/04/annrheumdis-2016-209724.full
UK-RiME : UK Research in Musculoskeletal Epidemiology
The UK Research in Musculoskeletal Epidemiology (UK-RiME) partnership is a national collaboration between eight epidemiology centres in the United Kingdom including Aberdeen. The partnership seeks to develop a co-ordinated training programme facilitated by exchanges between departments at PhD, post-doctoral, NIHR academic clinical fellow, clinical fellow and international trainee levels. UK-RiME facilitates access to one another’s cohorts and share analytical expertise with each other and the UK musculoskeletal research community.
Supervision
Supervisees
- MR ROSS MACDONALD
- MS STEPHANIE LEMBKE
- MRS ALISON MACIVER
- MISS NABEEHA ATTIQUE
Funding and Grants
- 2024-29/£1.2m/Versus Arthritis. “PrIOritising early detection of KNEE osteoaRthritis – PIOKNEER
- 2022-25/£999k/ Medical Research Council and Versus Arthritis Advanced Pain Discovery Platform. High Impact Chronic Pain and UK Biobank: presentation, transitions and targets for intervention
- 2022-24/£232k/Chief Scientist’s Office/ Supporting people with musculoskeletal disorders in Scotland to remain in work: adapting the Making it Work™ intervention developed for people with inflammatory arthritis in Canada (Co-Chief Investigator)
- 2021-25/£3,179k/MRC and Versus Arthritis/Consortium Against Pain inEquality (CAPE) - The impact of adverse childhood experiences on chronic pain and responses to treatment (Investigator and Work Package Lead)
- 2021-24/£485k /MRC/ Quantifying the Impact of Work on Paid Employment (Chief Investigator)
- 2021-26/£1,250k/British Society for Antimicrobial Chemotherapy/United Kingdom AntiMicrobial Registry (Co-chief Investigator)
- 2020-26/£2,488k/ NIHR/ NIHR Programme Grant: Development and evaluation of the Digital-My Arm Pain Programme (D-MAPP) for improving painful distal upper limb musculoskeletal disorders (Investigator)
- 2019-26/£2,300k/Medical Research Council & Versus Arthritis Centre of Excellence in Musculoskeletal Health and Work (Chief Investigator Investigator, Aberdeen)
- 2019-25/£1,138k/Versus Arthritis/Developing new models of care for people with fibromyalgia (PACFiND) (Chief Investigator)
- Teaching
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Teaching Responsibilities
Postgraduate (PhD) research students
The Epidemiology group welcomes applications in our research areas of interest.
External courses
Professor Macfarlane established a week-long Intensive Course in Applied Epidemiology (ICAE) at the University of Aberdeen. This course has been run here since 2007, having previously been run for 15 years at the University of Manchester. The course is highly rated by attendees, with attendees from Europe, Asia, the Americas and Australasia. The course is annual and starts on the first Monday in March. For further details and / or to register for the next course please see our ICAE web page.
The Epidemiology Group has also put on shorter courses at external locations including Warsaw and Bucharest and also runs courses focussed on specific clinical disciplines such as "Essentials in Epidemiology for Reproductive Health".
- Publications
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The characterisation and determinants of quality of life in ANCA associated vasculitis
Annals of the Rheumatic Diseases, vol. 73, no. 1, pp. 207-211Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1136/annrheumdis-2012-202750
A systematic review of evidence for the effectiveness of practitioner-based complementary and alternative therapies in the management of rheumatic diseases: Osteoarthritis
Rheumatology, vol. 51, no. 12, pp. 2224-2233Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/rheumatology/kes200
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
Systematic review and meta-analysis of the evidence for flexible sigmoidoscopy as a screening method for the prevention of colorectal cancer
British Journal of Surgery, vol. 99, no. 11, pp. 1488-1500Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/bjs.8882
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Functional Index (BASFI) is a better indicator of poor quality of life than Bath Ankylosing Spondylitis Disease Activity Index (BASDAI) in ankylosing spondylitis: results from SIRAS - the Scotland and Ireland Registry for Ankylosing Spondylitis
76th Annual Scientific Meeting of the American-College-of-Rheumatology (ACR) and Association-of-Rheumatology-Health-Professionals (ARHP) 2012, pp. S261Contributions to Journals: Abstracts- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/art.37735
The non-synonymous SNP, R1150W, in SCN9A is not associated with chronic widespread pain susceptibility
Molecular Pain, vol. 8, 72Contributions to Journals: ArticlesA systematic review of evidence for the effectiveness of practitioner-based complementary and alternative therapies in the management of rheumatic diseases: Rheumatoid arthritis
Rheumatology, vol. 51, no. 9, pp. 1707-1713Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/rheumatology/kes133
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
A high tender point count is associated with the presence of multiple idiopathic pain disorders: Results from a population study
European Journal of Pain (United Kingdom), vol. 16, no. 8, pp. 1195-1203Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1532-2149.2012.00127.x
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
Dysregulation of the autonomic nervous system and its association with the presence and intensity of chronic widespread pain
Arthritis Care and Research, vol. 64, no. 8, pp. 1209-1216Contributions to Journals: Articles- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/acr.21669
- [ONLINE] View publication in Scopus
Fatigue: prevalence, correlates and consequences: results from the Scotland and Ireland Registry for Ankylosing Spondylitis (SIRAS)
Scottish Medical Journal, vol. 57, no. 3, pp. 163-164Contributions to Journals: Abstracts- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1258/smj.2012.012030
The natural history of ankylosing spondylitis before and after commencing biological therapy
Scottish Medical Journal, vol. 57, no. 3, pp. 164Contributions to Journals: Abstracts- [ONLINE] DOI: https://doi.org/10.1258/smj.2012.012030