Dr Sarah Rylance is a consultant paediatrician with an interest in respiratory paediatrics and global health, currently based in Blantyre, Malawi.
Since graduating from Nottingham University Medical School in 2000, she has worked in Nottingham, Sheffield and Liverpool in the UK and spent several years working overseas in Tanzania and Malawi.
She is a honorary consultant at Alder Hey Children's Hospital in the UK and Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital in Blantyre, Malawi.
Sarah is currently a full-time PhD student on the MRC Doctoral Training Partnership in Global Health,under the auspices of IMPALA. The broad topic of her PhD is "Lung health across the life course in Malawi" and includes research projects on the prevalance and determinants of non-communicable lung disease in children and adults, and on the clinical and inflammatory phenotypes of paediatric asthma in Malawi.
RESEARCH
Sarah's PhD research has explored the prevalance of chronic respiratory symptoms, spirometric abnormalities and air pollution exposure of children and adults living in rural Malawi.
She is currently running a pilot randomised-controlled trial (PACTR 201807211617031) to assess the impact of an enhanced outpatient asthma care programme for children attending Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Blantyre. A key component of this programme is individualised asthma education for young people and their families, delivred by non-medically trained personnel.
Sarah is also local Principal Investigator in Malawi for ACACIA, a schools-based asthma project exploring barriers to achieving good asthma care in young people.