Health Survey England steering group

The Health Survey for England (HSE) comprises a series of annual surveys which cover the adult and child population living in private households in England. 

The surveys provide regular information that cannot be obtained from other sources about the public's health and associated factors.

The series of Health Surveys for England are designed to:

• estimate the proportion of people in England who have specified health conditions
• identify the prevalence of people with unmet health needs to help improve patient care
• provide annual data from nationally representative samples to monitor trends in the nation’s health over time
• monitor progress towards health targets to help improve patient care
• measure the height of children at different ages, replacing the National Study of Health and Growth (since 1995)
• monitor the prevalence of overweight and obesity in children to help improve care for children (since 1995)
• inform policy decision making and monitoring of health policies and health inequalities
• inform the need for and planning of health services locally to help improve patient care

The key users of the survey are policy makers, those working in public health, service providers, researchers, and third-sector organisations.

Each survey in the series includes core questions, and physical measurements such as blood pressure, height and weight and analysis of blood and saliva samples. In addition, there are modules of questions on specific topics that vary from year to year. In some years, the core sample has been supplemented by an additional boost sample from a specific population subgroup, such as minority ethnic groups, older people, or children.

The role of the Steering Group is advisory, and the aim is to guide the delivery of the survey and help ensure it meets the information needs of those involved in public health policy, services, and research.

As part of this role, members will be asked to:

• act as advocates of the survey, and highlight the importance of the survey to policy colleagues, and other colleagues and stakeholders
• consider the information and data needs of users of the survey
• provide direction and recommend priorities relating to the survey
• provide advice and guidance on changes in data to be collected, methodology, questionnaires, participant information and sample design
• provide advice on the analysis and reporting requirements and the presentation of results for stakeholders in public health, the public and the media
• provide advice and guidance on statistical issues relating to the survey
• resolve conflict over priorities where possible or escalate issues though the NHS Digital management chain

Meetings will usually be held 3 times a year and will be timed to reflect the group’s interest in advising on survey content and reporting. 

Meetings will be in Leeds or London when face to face or via Teams Video Conference. Discussions will also take place via email correspondence in the interim periods.

Members are asked to make every effort to attend meetings and provide feedback to email correspondence. Substitutes are allowed at meetings where attendance is not possible. Meetings will be held on a more frequent basis if required.

Papers produced for the steering group should not be circulated outside group membership, without permission of the Chair. Information will be issued in response to Freedom of Information (FOI) requests in line with general FOI procedures in NHS England.

Draft versions of technical papers will only be issued if specifically requested.

Membership will be reviewed regularly and updated as required.

NHS England

Fiona Daley

Fiona joined NHS Digital (now NHS England) in 2017, working just over 5 years in the Data Access Request Service (DARS), following previous roles within the Civil Service. Within DARS Fiona held roles such as enabling data delivery, creating and implementing an internal recruitment and training programme, and business management.

In 2022, Fiona moved roles to the Survey team within the Population Health area of Open Data as the Section Head, overlooking the delivery of several surveys, of which HSE is included.

Richard Steele

Richard has worked within the NHS for 15 years, initially in General Management within Tertiary, Acute and Mental Health Trusts prior to joining HSCIC (NHS Digital and now NHS England) in 2014. Richard has led national digital, technology and data programmes and now is the Assistant Director of Data Delivery within NHS England, responsible for delivery of new national data sets and data collections.

Prior to joining the NHS, Richard worked in educational development and served as an Officer in the Royal Navy.

National Centre for Social Research

Anne Conolly

Anne is a Research Director in the Health and Biomedical Surveys team at the National Centre for Social Research. She is responsible for the delivery of the Health Survey for England at NatCen. Anne specialises in the design, delivery, analysis, and dissemination of large-scale population health surveys with expertise in bio-social data collection methods. Anne has experience directing and managing a range of quantitative studies, including the Health Survey for England, the Millennium Cohort Study and Understanding Society.

Dr Suzanne Hill

Suzanne is a Research Director in the Health and Biomedical Surveys team at the National Centre for Social Research. She leads on reporting for the Health Survey for England series and runs the Gambling Survey for Great Britain, as well as managing small secondary analysis projects. She has expertise in analysis and reporting of health and biomedical data, including for a range of audiences.

Suzanne has extensive knowledge of health research, survey methodologies, and data management. She has previously worked on the National Diet and Nutrition Survey, the Mental Health of Children and Young People, and the National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles.

Mari Toomse-Smith

Mari is the Director of Health and Biomedical Surveys at the National Centre for Social Research. She leads a large team of social researchers working on a variety of health-related topics, ranging from mental health to nutrition, health behaviours and gambling. Her team is responsible for delivering such high-profile surveys as the Health Survey for England, the National Diet and Nutrition Survey and the Mental Adult Psychiatric Morbidity Survey. Mari is the overall quality director on the Health Survey for England.

Mari has extensive experience of successfully delivering large scale surveys and has a special interest in survey methodology, particularly in relation to health surveys and biomarker collection.

University College London

Dr Logan Manikam

Logan is a medical doctor and UK GMC certified Consultant in Public Health Medicine (PHM) with 13 years policy, academic and clinical experience (actively practising in acute medicine). Logan is currently working at UCL as a NIHR Senior Clinical and Practitioner Research Fellow co-leading the UCL Health Survey for England team. Additionally, Logan is an interim Consultant in PHM at Medway Council & Capacity, Training & Development Lead for Medway's NIHR Health Determinants Research Collaboration and Visiting Research Fellow at National University of Singapore (NUS). 

Dr Linda Ng Fat

Linda is a Co-principal Investigator of The Health Survey for England (HSE) at UCL. This includes leading the UCL team on research direction and impact of the survey and core-report writing. Linda has over 10 years of experience working with HSE as well as several other large, longitudinal and complex datasets. 

Linda’s main area of expertise is in Alcohol Epidemiology, which her PhD at the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, UCL was based on. Linda has since gone on to publish in several peer-reviewed journals on the area of alcohol use among older and younger adults, and on other subjects including ethnic and social inequalities, measuring BMI and Wellbeing. As a member of HSE Alcohol-Working group, Linda has been involved in assessing methodological changes to the way that alcohol consumption is measured in HSE. 

Office for National Statistics

Dr Katie Finning

Katie is a Lead Analyst in Public Policy Analysis at the Office for National Statistics. Her team have used the Health Survey for England for several analytical projects. Katie was previously a Research Fellow at the University of Exeter Medical School.

Julie Stanborough

Julie is the Deputy Director for Data & Analysis for Social Care and Health in the ONS. Julie is responsible for collecting, analysing, and publishing health and social care statistics, developing the Public Health Data Asset used for high impact analysis of linked health data and statistical coherence of UK health statistics. Julie has worked in a number of UK government departments, including the Department for Work and Pensions, HM Revenue & Customs, Department for Transport, and the Office for National Statistics. Julie has experience as a government analyst working on a diverse range of topics from income tax, health, child poverty and aviation. 

Office for Health Improvement and Disparities (Department of Health and Social Care)

Paul Niblett

Paul is currently the head of the Risk Factors Intelligence team in DHSC. The team analyses data on smoking, alcohol, gambling, obesity, physical activity, and nutrition. Prior to working for DHSC, Paul worked in NHS Digital where his tasks included being responsible for overseeing reporting from HSE.

University of Kent

Dr Robin Darton

Robin is a Senior Research Fellow at the Personal Social Services Research Unit (PSSRU) at the University of Kent. Robin has a background in psychology and statistics, and has interests in health, housing and social services provision for older people, particularly from a quantitative perspective. He has been involved in several major surveys of care homes, which led to the award of a PhD by Published Works in 2015, and has recently been involved in studies of safety in care homes and transitions between care settings. Robin was a member of the research team that developed the module of questions on the need for, provision of and receipt of care services incorporated in the Health Survey for England from 2011. He was part of the PSSRU team commissioned by the Department of Health to evaluate extra care housing schemes supported by the Extra Care Housing Fund, and he was a member of the EPSRC-funded Sheffield/PSSRU team that developed the EVOLVE tool for the evaluation and assessment of extra care housing design. 

From 2012, Robin worked with colleagues from the Universities of Bristol and Worcester, Housing and Care 21 and the Housing Learning and Improvement Network on the Adult Social Services Environments and Settings (ASSET) and the Provision of Social Care in Extra Care Housing (ECHO) studies, which were funded by the Department of Health’s NIHR School for Social Care Research to explore the provision and delivery of adult social care in housing with care schemes. In 2020, he was the joint editor of a special issue of the Journal of Aging and Environment on home adaptation. In 2022–23, Robin was a member of the PSSRU team commissioned to undertake a scoping study of the benefits and costs of domiciliary care under the NIHR Policy Research Programme call on understanding the economic case for domiciliary care; this led to a successful application by the PSSRU team for funding for a primary research project due to begin in July 2024.

PHE/Public Health Rep (retired)

Dr Sunjai Gupta

Sunjai joined the original team in the Department of Health in 1991 which helped to set up the Health Survey for England, including the pilot study and future planning of the Survey and its content. Sunjai majored on the medical and epidemiological aspects including chairing two working groups which made recommendations to the main Steering Group on the choice of blood pressure measuring equipment and the design and implementation of a calibration study to help clinicians and others interpret the readings of the automatic blood pressure measuring device which was chosen at that time. Sunjai was also involved in the procurement of contractors to carry out the Survey fieldwork. Later Sunjai and his team became a customer for the health survey data both for policy purposes and for secondary analysis for use in research. He later rejoined the Health Survey Steering Group and continued as a member even after leaving government.      

London School of Economics

Raphael Wittenberg

Raphael is deputy director of the Care Policy and Evaluation Centre at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Raphael is an economist leading and conducting research projects funded through NIHR Policy Research Units and by other funders. The topics include projections of future demand for long-term care, unpaid care, and care for people with dementia.