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Dr. LEAH MACADEN BSc (N), RN RM, MSc (N), PhD, SFHEA.

Senior Lecturer, Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, UK

Churchill Fellow – 2019 & Lead for Internationalisation

Department of Nursing & Midwifery, School of Health, Social Care & Life Sciences

University of the Highlands & Islands (Highland Campus) 

Dr Leah Macaden is a Senior Lecturer from the Department of Nursing and Midwifery at University of the Highlands and Islands (UHI) in Scotland. She has a wide range of academic, clinical, management and research expertise that spans across India and the United Kingdom for over two decades. She is a Senior Fellow of the Advance HE and an alumnus of the Scottish Crucible. Dr Macaden has pioneered two innovative dementia curricula – Being Dementia Smart (BDS) whilst at the University of Stirling [UoS] in 2013 and DEEPE (Dementia Enhanced Education to Promote Excellence) for UHI in 2017 – both first of their kind using an integrated approach to undergraduate dementia nurse education mapped along the stages of the dementia journey and aligned to the Enhanced Level of Scotland’s Promoting Excellence Framework. In recognition of her leadership and expertise in the area of dementia education, she was awarded the Churchill Fellowship in 2019 for knowledge exchange and to explore models and pedagogical approaches to dementia education and training at Johns Hopkins and the University of Pennsylvania in the USA and Asia (Singapore and India).  

Her academic and research expertise include older adults with multimorbidity, sensory / cognitive impairments, pedagogy, blended approaches to learning, coproduction of resources for education and training and research mentoring. Her methodological expertise is with Qualitative research. She successfully led an academic – industry service development innovation to advance the symptom monitor and track feature within the CogniCare App to support family carers of people with dementia in 2019.

Her research grants include securing two externally funded PhD studentships that are focused on Technology Enabled Dementia Education and Support (TEDES) for Health Care Professionals in Rural Scotland and the role of technology and virtual access to the outdoor environment on the wellbeing of people living with dementia in a care home setting. She was recently awarded the competitive COVID – 19 Action Fund [2020] as a Churchill Fellow to design the first dementia education resource for blended learning and training of staff working in care homes: COVID – 19 Dementia Education Program for Care Homes [CODECH] which will become part of the proposed COVID – 19 Knowledge Bank in the UK.

Her track record with PGR supervision is consistently recognised with student led university awards – Recognising Achievement in Teaching Excellence for Postgraduate Research supervision in 2018 from UoS and a High Commendation from HISA [Highlands and Islands Student Association] as the Best Research / Dissertation Supervisor in 2020 at UHI.

If you are a researcher in dementia and brain health based in Scotland, and would like to have to share your work in our Research Spotlight, please get in touch.

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