Natasha Rafter MBChB, MPH, MD

Dr. Natasha Rafter, MBChB, MPH, MD, is an Honorary Lecturer at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland. Natasha is the Principal Investigator on the iCAARE study examining the effectiveness and implementation of After Action Review in an Irish hospital. Her research interests include adverse events, healthcare-associated infections, medication safety, cardiovascular risk assessment, access to treatment, and medication adherence. She completed her MD on the Irish National Adverse Events Study (INAES), a chart review study of adverse events in eight acute hospitals in Ireland, the results of which provided the first national estimate of adverse event prevalence and cost in Ireland. Dr. Rafter was a co-applicant in the second adverse events study (INAES-2) that reported on the longitudinal trends in adverse events between 2009 and 2015 in Ireland.

Natasha graduated in medicine from Otago University, New Zealand, and was a clinician in hospital and general practice settings prior to commencing specialist training in public health medicine. During this training, she worked in communicable disease, refugee health, and healthcare funding and planning. Her projects included a multisite norovirus outbreak investigation, a review of asylum seeker mental health services, a cost-utility analysis of cyclo-oxygenase inhibitors, and a business case for district-wide cardiovascular risk assessment.

Natasha was a co-principal investigator on a cluster randomized trial examining point-of-care testing on cardiovascular risk assessment completion in primary care and a senior research fellow on two randomized controlled trials of cardiovascular combination medication. She has also worked in pharmacovigilance at the Irish and New Zealand medicines regulators. Dr. Rafter has expertise in adverse events, medical record review, statistical analysis, systematic reviews, randomized controlled trials, adherence, adverse drug reactions and medicines regulation, health technology assessment, and communicable disease control.