Professor Rashan Haniffa

Rashan's research focus is to improve care for critically ill patients globally by enabling a community of practice that uses a common data platform for continuous data driven evaluation, evidence generation and practice change.

Professor Rashan Haniffa

Chair of Critical Care Medicine and Health Systems Research

Contact details

• Email: rhaniffa@ed.ac.uk
• Web: Academic profile

Group Members

• Critical Care Asia and Africa network members
• NICS-MORU, Sri Lanka team members

PhD supervision

• Bharath Kumar Tirupakuzhi Vijayaraghavan, University of Amsterdam
• Dilanthi Gamage Dona, University of Birmingham
• Diptesh Aryal, Instituto D'Or de Pesquisa e Ensino, Brazil
• Swagata Tripathy, University of Edinburgh
• Vrindha Pari, University of Birmingham
• Cornelius Sendagire, Instituto D'Or de Pesquisa e Ensino, Brazil
• Sumaiya Arfin, University of Amsterdam

Research Overview

Rashan co-leads the Wellcome UKRI/MRC Collaboration for Research, Implementation and Training in Asia and Africa (CCAA). This research consortium seeks to develop and implement near real-time digital healthcare registries, undertake population health surveillance and interventional research in LMICs. The research seeks to understand how clinical registries can be leveraged to provide real-time feedback for public health surveillance, critical care practice improvement and equitable participation in clinical trials. The overarching goal of the research is to empower a community of practice to solve healthcare problems.

Biographical Profile

Rashan trained in medicine at the University of Colombo and subsequently completed training as a critical care physician and anaesthetist in the UK. Rashan was awarded a PhD scholarship by the University of Oxford, where his doctoral work was on developing methods for continuous healthcare evaluation in resource-limited settings. During this time he co-founded NICS-MORU, a not-for-profit research unit based in Sri Lanka, that develops and curates digital registries to strengthen research capacity and facilitate data-driven service improvement in Asia and Africa. NICS-MORU also functions as the data coordinating centre for multinational observational and interventional research projects. He has also completed a MSc in Clinical Trials at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. Rashan works clinically as a consultant in intensive care medicine at the General Sir John Kotelawala Defence University Hospital, Sri Lanka and at University College Hospitals London.

Honours and Awards

• NIHR Academic Clinical Lecturer, 2018-2020
• President's (Sri Lanka) award for scientific research
• Intensive Care Society (UK), Research Gold Medal - 2016/17
• Global Rising Star – Australia New Zealand Intensive Care Society- 2015/16
• Ten Outstanding Young Persons of Sri Lanka - 2015/16
• NIHR Academic Clinical Fellowship- 2009/12
• Intensive Care Society (UK) – MSc Braun Fellowship - 2008
• First class honours and best academic performance, University of Colombo - 2003

Other Responsibilities

• Affiliate member, Usher Institute
• Director, NICS-MORU
• First Trustee, NICST (UK charity 1171106)
• Co-chair, WHO Covid-19 Global Data Platform
• Scientific committee, ISARIC
• Honorary Associate Professor, Department of Interventional Surgery, UCL
• Steering committee, national critical care registries- India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka

Collaborators

Internal

• Dr Abi Beane
• Professor Kenneth Baillie
• Professor Kev Dhaliwal
• Dr David Griffith
• Dr Nazir Lone
• Professor Manu Shankar-Hari
• Professor Timothy Walsh

External

• Professor Arjen M Dondorp, University of Oxford
• Professor Ramani Moonesinge, University College London
• Professor Krishnarajah Nirantharakumar, University of Birmingham
• Professor Jorge Salluh Instituto D'Or de Pesquisa e Ensino, Brazil