Dr Bharathy Kumaravel

I am the Public Health theme lead and am passionate about integrating Public Health and Evidence Based Medicine into undergraduate and postgraduate medical education.  I bring innovative approaches to teach Public Health to future doctors and am leading on several research projects in medical education.  My research interests lie in designing and delivering a multi-faceted, clinically integrated Public Health curriculum with assessments.

I am keen on providing community immersion opportunities for tomorrow's doctors, so they understand the health and social care needs of the most vulnerable in the community.  I collaborate with colleagues in the local health and social care teams to design novel SSCs for medical students. I also hold an honorary consultant Public Health Medicine post in Leicestershire County Council, where I am the lead for Healthcare Public Health.  I work closely with University Hospitals of Leicester NHS trust and Primary Care Networks to provide Public Health advice to take on a population health management approach to tackling health inequalities. 

My research interests span Public Health and Medical Education.  

1. Kumaravel B, Stewart C, Ilic D. Face-to-face versus online clinically integrated EBM teaching in an undergraduate medical school: a pilot study. BMJ Evid Based Med. 2021 Oct 11:bmjebm-2021-111776. doi: 10.1136/bmjebm-2021-111776. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 34635481.

    

2. Kumaravel, B., Stewart, C. & Ilic, D. Development and evaluation of a spiral model of assessing EBM competency using OSCEs in undergraduate medical education. BMC Med Educ 21, 204 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12909-021-02650-7

    

3. Rawther F, Bondje S, Rahman A, Duku A, Gooneratne S, Beck M, Ubhi S, Gleeson C, Kumaravel B, Harris J. Community immersion project to enhance medical students understanding of the health needs of the most vulnerable in the community.BMJ Leader Published Online First: 25 March 2021. doi: 10.1136/leader-2020-000382

    

4. Stewart C, Kumaravel B, O'Dowd J, McKeown A, et al. 2021, 'The rOSCE: A remote clinical examination during COVID lockdown and beyond', MedEdPublish, 10, [1], 11, https://doi.org/10.15694/mep.2021.000011.1

    

5. Kumaravel, B., Jenkins, H., Chepkin, S. et al. A prospective study evaluating the integration of a multifaceted evidence-based medicine curriculum into early years in an undergraduate medical school. BMC Med Educ 20, 278 (2020).

    

6. Kumaravel, B., Hearn, J.H., Jahangiri, L. et al. A systematic review and taxonomy of tools for evaluating evidence-based medicine teaching in medical education. Syst Rev 9, 91 (2020).

    

7. Stocker C, Cooney A, Thomas P, Kumaravel B et al. 2018, 'Schwartz rounds in undergraduate medical education facilitates active reflection and individual identification of learning need ', MedEdPublish, 7, [4], 9.

    

8. Jennings A, Hughes CA, Kumaravel B, Bachmann MO, Steel N, Capehorn M, Cheema K.Evaluation of a multidisciplinary Tier 3 weight management service for adults with morbid obesity, or obesity and comorbidities, based in primary care.Clin Obes. 2014 Oct;4(5):254-66.

    

9. Cox JM, Steel N, Clark AB, Kumaravel B, Bachmann MO Do referral-management schemes reduce hospital outpatient attendances? Time-series evaluation of primary care referral management.Br J Gen Pract. 2013 Jun;63(611): e386-92.

    

10. Kumaravel B, Bachmann MO, Murray N, et al. Use of haemoglobin A1c to detect impaired fasting glucose or Type 2 diabetes in a United Kingdom community-based population. Diabetes Res Clin Pract. 2012;96(2):211-216. doi: 10.1016/j.diabres.2011.12.004

     

11. Catherine E. Hewitt, Bharathy Kumaravel, Jo C. Dumville, David J. Torgerson on behalf of the trial attrition study group.  Assessing the impact of attrition in randomised controlled trials.  Journal of Clinical Epidemiology, 2010.

     

12. Jacoby DB, Yost BL, Kumaravel B, Chan-Li Y, Xiao HQ, Kawashima K, Fryer AD. Glucocorticoid treatment increases inhibitory m (2) muscarinic receptor expression and function in the airways.  Am J Respir Cell Mol Biol. 2001 Apr; 24(4):485-91.
    
    
13. Bharathy Kumaravel, T.S. Kumaravel, N. Gajendiran, Mary N. Mohankumar and Mansyur Arif.  Molecular genetic markers predict development of drug-induced leukemias in patients undergoing cytotoxic therapy.  Indian Journal of Pharmacology 29 (6), 1997; 405-410.
14. Kumaravel B, Arihiro K, Kaneko M, Fujii S, Inai K.  Expression of bcl-2 Protein in Breast Carcinoma with Correlation to Expression of p53 Protein and Clinicopathological Factors.  Breast Cancer. 1996 Dec 20;3(3):173-179.2.

I am an educational supervisor for Public Health trainees and am also the clinical supervisor for several junior doctors.  I supervise trainees, junior doctors and  medical students on Public Health projects in the community, local authorities and acute trusts.  Projects involve reviewing care pathways to provide an evidence based recommendation to improve clinical and cost effectiveness. 

I also supervise junior doctors on medical education research projects.  I take a participatory action approach while reviewing medical education and healthcare services.  I engage with students, junior doctors and colleagues to seek their views and co-create the curriculum. 

Undergraduate Medical Education- Integrating Public Health and clinical research as a theme in undergraduate medical education.  In addition to designing a clinically integrated multifaceted teaching in early years, I design novel formative assessments to assess students' application of knowledge and skills in patient care when they are in clinical rotations.  I have designed new workplace based assessments and summative assessments in Public Health and clinical research methods.

Postgraduate Medical Education- as the Public Health lead in Health Education England ,East Midlands, I am evaluating the feasibility of integrating Population Health and Generalism into Internal Medicine Training program.  

Selected Conference papers

1. Kumaravel B, Ilic D, Stocker C, et al. Assessing medical students’ competency in evidence-based medicine using the ACE tool- a cross sectional study of medical students across different stages of the curriculum.  BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine 2019;24: A23-A24.

1. Akande A, Neves A, Collis J, Rafique M, Kumaravel B, Gale S. Evidence in action.  BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine 2019;24: A47.

1. Kumaravel B, Ilic D, Stewart C, et al.  A pragmatic trial of blended learning versus online learning for clinically integrating evidence-based medicine teaching in an undergraduate medical school.  BMJ Evidence-Based Medicine 2019;24: A46.

Selected Conference presentations 

Objective structured clinical examinations (OSCEs) for assessing public health knowledge and skills in undergraduate medical students-feasibility, validity, and reliability.  Kumaravel B, Stewart C.  Ottawa 2020

Community-based medical education: an approach to better connect our universities with public health practice. S Bose, B Kumaravel, P Webster, W Hart.  Presented at the Faculty of Public Health conference, UK, 2017

Using technology enhanced learning to improve medical students’ understanding and application of public health principles to clinical practice.  B Kumaravel, H Jenkins, E Fillmore, J Hearn.  Presented at ASME Annual Scientific Meeting, Belfast, UK 2016

Comprehensive partnership programme to improve Cervical Cancer Screening outcome in Bedfordshire Sen, Annapurna; Kumaravel Bharathy; Wonford, Barbara; Priestnall, Eleanor; Fenton, Cath. Presented at PHE conference 2016

Piloting a primary care-based weight management programme in North Norfolk.  B. Kumaravel, C.Hughes, L.Macleod, J.Harries.  Presented at the Faculty of Public Health Conference, Birmingham, UK 2011

Cancer expenditure review in NHS Great Yarmouth and Waveney.B.Kumaravel, M.Connolly, H.Brar, T.Winters, M.Parsons, A.Lipp .Faculty of Public Health Conference, London, UK, 2010.

Diagnostic accuracy of HbA1c for impaired fasting glycaemia in people at high risk of type 2 diabetes. Bharathy Kumaravel, Max Bachmann, Ketan Dhatariya, Garry John, Tracey Scarpello, Mike Sampson. UKPHA 2010, Bournemouth, UK

Teenage women’s perceptions of contraception and sexual health services in the city of York.  Bharathy Kumaravel, Steven Oliver, Rachel Johns and Sarah Furness.  UKPHA 2009, Brighton, UK

Risk factors for sternal surgical site infections.  Bharathy Kumaravel, Clare Barry, Mary Vearncombe, Andrew Simor, Alex Kiss. Sunnybrook & Women’s College, Toronto.  Presented at the SHEA (Society for Health Care Epidemiology)-2005 LA, California, April 2005.