Professor Catherine Rice-Evans serves as the Interim Director of the Cicely Saunders Institute and holds a clinical professorship in Palliative Care at King's College London. She has maintained a joint clinical academic position since 2011 between King's College London and Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust, demonstrating exceptional commitment to bridging clinical practice and academic research. As an Honorary Nurse Consultant with a background in district nursing and palliative care, she brings extensive frontline experience to her leadership roles. Her professional trajectory includes significant contributions to research capacity building as Deputy-Director of the King's Clinical Academic Training Office, developing clinical academic career pathways for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals. She has established herself as a national and international leader in palliative care and nursing through her dual clinical-academic career and major research programs.
Professor Rice-Evans' research focuses on the integration of palliative care in community health and social care for older adults with multiple conditions including dementia and frailty, addressing a critical gap in healthcare provision for vulnerable populations. She co-leads the major ESRC/NIHR funded EMBED-Care program (Empowering Better End of Life Dementia Care), which has significantly advanced evidence-based approaches to dementia care across multiple countries. Her pioneering work includes the OPTCare Elderly trial that optimizes palliative care for older people with frailty and multimorbidities in community settings, establishing new standards for care delivery. She has developed innovative research methods in palliative care through the MORECare_Capacity statement on the process of consent for adults with impaired capacity, addressing complex ethical challenges in elderly care research. Her NIHR funded SPACE study addresses managing clinical uncertainty for adults with frailty, contributing substantially to evidence-based practice in geriatric palliative care.
As a senior clinical academic nurse, Professor Rice-Evans has positioned herself at the forefront of global research on health system-strengthening for ageing populations, influencing policy and practice internationally. Her commitment to research capacity building has fostered the development of the next generation of clinical academics across nursing, midwifery and allied health professions, creating sustainable impact beyond her direct research. She continues to advance translational research through securing multiple NIHR personal fellowships that reflect her dedication to integrating clinical practice with academic research. Professor Rice-Evans maintains an active leadership role in shaping palliative care services through her directorship of the Cicely Saunders Institute and ongoing research programs. Her work promises to further transform community-based palliative care systems and improve outcomes for aging populations with complex health needs worldwide.
