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Last checked 12th June 2025

Dr Bibha Simkhada is a Reader in Nursing and the Deputy Director of Graduate Education in the Department of Nursing at the School of Human and Health Sciences. She also serves as the Co-Chair of the Asian Staff Affinity Group at the University. 

Previously, she was a Senior Lecturer in Adult Nursing at the University of Huddersfield and a Lecturer at Bournemouth University. Her research interests include include a wide range of international nursing workforce development, healthy ageing (including dementia care), health inequalities related to homelessness, and ethnic diversity. She is particularly dedicated to enhancing the skills and capacities of nurses and midwives in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). She has expertise in rapid reviews, narrative reviews, systematic reviews, qualitative and mixed-methods research.

With a background in Adult Nursing and Public Health, she brings extensive experience from her work in the National Health Service (NHS) UK and internationally, including Nepal, Ghana, India, and Bangladesh. She hold her PhD in Public Health from the University of Aberdeen. 

Her previous projects include:

• The Health Innovation Exchange (HIE) Project, a collaborative support program aimed at accelerating innovation in health and social care by connecting businesses with world-class healthcare technology and resources focusing on Dementia.
• The Interreg Europe-funded project "HELIUM", which focused on sharing and implementing European best practices to inform local strategies and improve policy efficiency in healthcare innovation.
• Continuing professional development (CPD) and career progression of nurses.
• Women's health in developing countries.
• Health and well-being of the South Asian community in the UK.

Recently completed projects and research projects
1. Improving health and wellbeing of homeless people through improved access to health and social care services in West Yorkshire (PI), funded from NHS West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board.
2. International nurses and their integration into the United Kingdom health and social care workforce (Co-I), funded from NHS England.
3. Review of nursing practice regulation in Ghana (Co-I), funded from the Tropical Health & Education Trust (THET) commissioned by Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (LSTM).
4. Developing nurses/midwives’ leadership through quality improvement project (PI), funded from Burdett Trust and THET partnerships for Global Health, UK. 
5. The key issues in dementia care in South Asia and prevalence of dementia risk in Nepal (PI), funded from Bournemouth University/University of Huddersfield
6. Prevalence, predictors and experiences of people living with dementia in Ghana (Co-I), funded from University of Huddersfield.
7. Promoting Technology for Self-Care (ProTechS) for people who are sleeping rough (Co-I), funded from Burdett Trust.
8. Exploring Continuing Professional Development (CPD) training needs of nurses and midwives in Nepal (PI), funded from LJMU/BU.
9. Factors affecting access to mental health services in the Nepali and Iranian communities living in UK (PI), funded from Bournemouth University.
Ongoing research projects
1. Strengthen the ability of the Nursing and Midwifery Council (N&MC) of Ghana to oversee and regulate the professional register of nurses and midwives and monitor the quality of education providers, to ensure high quality nursing and midwifery care (PI), funded from the UK Department of Health and Social Care, via the Tropical Health and Education Trust (THET).
2. Nursing Fellowship in partnership with the Nursing Now Challenge (NNCF) Programme Phase 2 in Bangladesh (PI), funded from THET Partnership for Global Health and Burdett Trust for Nursing. 
3. Mental health experiences and coping strategies of Asian or Asian British children and young people in West Yorkshire (Co-I), funded from NHS West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board.
4. A multi-country longitudinal cohort study on non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in the Global South: A programme to generate income, outputs, and impact in Ghana, India and Nepal (Co-I), funded from URF, University of Huddersfield.

PhD Project Supervision Titles: 
International Nurses/Nurses wellbeing 
*Cross-country comparison of international nurses? experiences of career progression and retention in the UK (Ransford Akrong)

*Factors affecting the recruitment of Nepalese nurses in the UK: A mixed-method study (Sabina Shrestha)

*Boosting resilience through intervention, which promotes change in coping behaviour to support well-being and retention of early career nurses in coping behaviours to support the well-being of student nurses (Elizabeth Hather)

Maternal health and Maternity care
*Investigating mediating effect of birth experience on the association between antenatal social support and postnatal depression among primiparous women visiting maternity hospitals in Nepal (Basanti Aryal)

*Inequity in Utilization of Maternal Healthcare Services and their Contributing Factors for Women with Disabilities in Nepal: Mixed Method Study (Prakash Shahi)

*Co-design in health services: an initiative to improve the uptake and delivery of the free maternal and newborn health services in Nepal (Devendra Raj Singh)

*A mixed method study exploring challenges and barriers in the utilization of maternal healthcare services among women with disability in India (Divya Vinnakota)

*Health actors' perception and impact of federalisation on the quality of maternal and neonatal health services in Nepal (Pasang Tamang) (completed)