Miss Rizwana Lala
BDS, MDPH (Distinction), DDPH RCS (Eng), PGCiLT, FHEA, PhD
School of Medicine and Population Health
Wellcome Trust Research Fellow
Honorary Consultant in Dental Public Health
- Profile
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I joined the Division of Population Health in 2024 as a Wellcome Trust Research Fellow.
I am a qualified dentist and have worked in general dental practice, community dentistry and oral and maxillofacial surgery. In 2020, I completed academic dental public health training in Yorkshire and the Humber. My clinical public health portfolio includes dentistry, the national COVID response, and climate and sustainability. I am currently an honorary consultant in Dental Public Health at NHS England.
I am a mixed methods researcher including qualitative and quantitative methodologies. My interest in equality and diversity is reflected across my clinical, teaching and research practice. Using my research findings I make evidence-informed recommendations to widen participation and representation of women, racialised minorities and those from deprived backgrounds across health and university institutions.
- Research interests
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My ethnographic research integrates clinical public health and medical sociology to analyse how commercial involvement in health systems reinforces social inequalities along the intersections of race, class and gender.
My PhD in cosmetic dentistry investigated how healthcare is commercialised through beauty practices. I have been awarded a Wellcome Trust Early Career Fellowship (2023-2028) to examine how commercial involvement in sugar-related public health policies and practices impacts racialised communities.
- Publications
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- Grants
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Wellcome Trust Early Career Award, (PI, £990,915, 2023-2028) - Sugar-Related Public Health Approaches Analysed Through the Lens of Racial Capitalism
Education and Research Innovation Committee (ERIC) - NHS Health Education England, Yorkshire and Humber, (PI, £10,000, 2017-2018) - The management of dental care of people living with blood-borne viruses in general dental practice
Women Academic Returners Programme (WARP) award - University of Sheffield, (PI, £10,000, 2018-2020) - The Great British Smile: An institutional ethnography of power in cosmetic dentistry
NHS Health Education England, East Midlands - Open competition funding for PhD as part of Academic Clinical Lecturer Training Post, 2013-2020 – extended due to parental leave
- Teaching interests
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My teaching interests include decolonial work and inclusive teaching practice. I led on decolonial work on the Master in Dental Public Health. I arrange learning on race, equality and decolonial work in public health at NHS England.
- Teaching activities
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I facilitate undergraduate tutorials in clinical governance and ethics and teach on the Master in Dental Public Health course.
- Professional activities and memberships
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Regional Dental Epidemiology Coordinator (East Midlands) – coordinating national dental surveys in a wide range of settings such as schools and care homes
Member of Dental Quality Improvement Group (East Midlands and East of England) — leading an audit on patient and public participation in dental commissioning
Peer reviewer for dental, public health and education journals such as Community Dental Health, Journal of Dental Education, British Dental Journal