Amanda Burls

Professor Amanda Burls is a distinguished Public Health Physician and academic at City, University of London, where she holds the position of Professor of Public Health. She has held prior academic leadership roles at the University of Birmingham and the University of Oxford, where she directed postgraduate programmes in Evidence-Based Health Care. Her career is marked by significant contributions to evidence-based medicine, health technology assessment, and public involvement in health research.

Her educational background is highly interdisciplinary: she earned a BA in Politics, Philosophy, and Economics from the University of Oxford, followed by an MB BS in Medicine from University College London (UCL), where she also completed an MSc in Neuroscience. She further obtained an MSc in Public Health Medicine from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and a Diploma in Learning and Teaching in Higher Education from the University of Oxford.

Amanda’s research is centered on Evidence-Based Health Care (EBHC), online health research, and public and patient involvement in health decisions. She founded the West Midlands Health Technology Assessment Collaboration (WMHTAC) and leads ThinkWell—The International Network for Knowledge about Wellbeing. Her work consistently emphasizes ethical prioritization, transparency, and equity in health policy.

Her publication record is extensive, with over 130 peer-reviewed articles, primarily in high-impact journals like Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, BMC Medicine, and Lancet. Her recent articles focus on long COVID, digital health interventions, diagnostic accuracy of alternative therapies, and public involvement in trial design. These works span disciplines including public health, epidemiology, clinical ethics, and science communication.

Among her many accolades are the Egon Jonsson Award, multiple teaching excellence awards from Oxford, and national clinical excellence awards. She is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy and the Faculty of Public Health.

Amanda has advised and collaborated globally, particularly in Spanish-speaking countries, and has been instrumental in promoting public engagement in research. She has led numerous workshops, delivered keynote speeches, and developed educational resources to strengthen evidence literacy among professionals and the public alike. Her leadership in the Critical Appraisal Skills Programme (CASP) and the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine underscores her commitment to improving healthcare through rigorous, transparent science.