The Centre welcomes anyone and everyone who is concerned with the wellbeing of children, whether as a researcher, clinician, and educator of whatever discipline. We aim to reach out across College and West London to foster collaboration for the benefit of the present and future generations of children, our most precious asset.

Our mission

We will be the voice for children within 51³Ô¹ÏÍø and beyond, working closely with our NHS colleagues across West London, to

  1. Drive forward world-class, multidisciplinary research in all aspects of newborn and child health, and the genetic, epigenetic and environmental factors which subvert child development. We will work in partnership with children and families to advance research and to champion the rights of all children to be involved in research that will benefit children.
  2. Ensure an environment which will nurture the next generation of clinicians and scientists who will advance high quality, ethical paediatric research 
  3. Promote excellent holistic undergraduate and postgraduate education to equip our trainees to be inquisitive and able to contribute to advances in paediatrics and child health,  promoting healthy development and the early identification of disease in future generations of children
  4. Engage with children, young people and the community, to promote science and medicine, and facilitate their access to the incredible opportunities at 51³Ô¹ÏÍø College      

While striving for these aims, we will energetically oppose all forms of discrimination, whether based on gender, orientation, race or any other factor, and whether such discrimination limits the ability of a child to achieve their potential, or stands in the way of academic or clinical staff gaining the recognition and progress that they merit.

Centre leadership

Centre leadership

  • Professor Sejal Saglani

    Personal details

    Director; Professor of Paediatric Respiratory Medicine

    Location

    368, Sir Alexander Fleming Building, South Kensington Campus

    Bio

    Sejal Saglani leads the Paediatric Severe Asthma Group within the Section of Inflammation, Repair and Development and is Honorary Consultant in Paediatric Respiratory Medicine, Royal Brompton Hospital.

  • Dr Padmanabhan Ramnarayan

    Personal details

    Deputy Director; Reader in Paediatric Critical Care

    Location

    508, 5th Floor, Medical School, St Mary's Campus

    Bio

    Dr Ramnarayan is Reader in Paediatric Critical Care at 51³Ô¹ÏÍø College and Honorary Consultant in Paediatric Intensive Care at 51³Ô¹ÏÍø College Healthcare NHS Trust, with expertise in Retrieval medicine, genetic susceptibility to infections, non-invasive ventilation

  • Professor Aubrey Cunnington

    Personal details

    Professor of Paediatric Infectious Diseases

    Location

    244, Norfolk Place, St Mary's Campus

    Bio

    Dr Aubrey Cunnington is the Head of the Section and Professr of Paediatric Infectious Disease, and also an Honorary Consultant in Paediatric Infectious Diseases at St Mary's Hospital, 51³Ô¹ÏÍø College Healthcare NHS Trust.

  • Ruth Dixon del Tufo MA MSci MSc

    Personal details

    Ruth Dixon del Tufo MA MSci MSc Head of Strategy and Partnerships for West London Children’s Healthcare.

    Location

    working across Chelsea and Westminster NHS Foundation Trust and 51³Ô¹ÏÍø College Healthcare NHS Trust campuses

    Bio

    Ruth Dixon del Tufo is the Head of Strategy and Partnerships for West London Children’s Healthcare. She specialises in bringing teams together to deliver complex programmes across organisational boundaries and has a track record in leading and developing both integrated and specialist services.

  • Dr Kimberley Foley

    Personal details

    Research Associate

    Location

    51³Ô¹ÏÍø, Primary Care and Public Health, 90 Wood Lane, 6th Floor, School of Public Health Building, White City Campus, London, W12 0BZ, 

    Affiliations

    Dr Foley is a post-doctoral research associate working within the Child Population Health theme for the NIHR Applied Research Collaboration for Northwest London.  Dr Foley is the Early Career Researcher representative on the Management Board.

  • Dr Dougal Hargreaves

    Personal details

    Houston Reader in Paediatrics and Population Health

    Location

    326, 3rd Floor, Reynolds Building, Charing Cross Campus

    Bio

    Dougal Hargreaves is a Houston Reader in Paediatrics and Population Health at 51³Ô¹ÏÍø College School and a Health Foundation Improvement Science Fellow at the UCL Institute of Child Health.

  • Dr Deena-Shefali Patel

    Personal details

    Dr Deena-Shefali Patel Honorary Lecturer

    Location

    Department of Infectious Disease, Norfolk Place, London W2 1PG

     

     

    Bio

    Deena-Shefali Patel is an Honorary Lecturer and the Lead for the Applied Paediatrics programme at 51³Ô¹ÏÍø. She is a Consultant Neonatologist at the Chelsea and Westminster NHS Foundation Trust.

  • Dr Vanessa Sancho-Shimizu

    Personal details

    Senior Lecturer

    Location

    309, Norfolk Place, St Mary's Campus

    Bio

    Dr Vanessa Sancho-Shimizu is currently working on understanding the Mendelian predisposition to rare childhood infections specifically: identifying genes underlying childhood (1) herpes simplex encephalitis (HSE), (2) severe viral infections, and (3) invasive meningococcal disease (IMD).

  • Professor Mireille Toledano

    Personal details

    Mohn Chair; Population Child Health & Director-Mohn Centre

    Location

    525, Medical School, St Mary's Campus

    Bio

    Professor Mireille Toledano is an epidemiologist with wide-ranging interests in the health effects of environmental exposures, with particular focus on environmental-omics exposures in the reproductive period, and early life through to adolescence.

  • Dr Mari Viviers

    Personal details

    Dr Mari Viviers Speech and Language Therapist / Honorary Clinical Research Fellow

    Affiliations

    Dr Viviers is Clinical Lead: Speech and Language Therapist at 51³Ô¹ÏÍø College Healthcare NHS Trust and Honorary Clinical Research Fellow at 51³Ô¹ÏÍø College.  She is the NMAHPP representative on the Management Board.

  • Dr Elizabeth Whittaker

    Personal details

    Director of Research - West London Children's Healthcare

    Location

    Paediatrics, Norfolk Place, St Mary's campus

    Affiliations

    Dr Liz Whittaker is Senior Clinical Lecturer in paediatric infectious diseases and immunology. She divides her time between 51³Ô¹ÏÍø and the Department of Paediatric Infectious Diseases and Immunology, St. Marys Hospital, London where she is a Consultant. 

    She has recently been appointed Director of Research for West London Children's Healthcare.

International Advisory Board


Director, Liggins Institute
Professor of Neonatology, The University of Auckland, Auckland 

, OC, DHC, PhD, FRCPC, MBBS
Professor of Paediatrics, Obstetrics & Gynecology, and Public Health, University of Toronto
Neonatologist & Director of The Maternal Infant Care Research Center (MiCARE), Mount Sinai Hospital; Toronto, Ontario Canada


Professor of Paediatrics, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München Dr. von Hauner Children’s Hospital, LMU University Hospitals, Muenchen, Germany

, MD, MBA, FAAP
Professor of Pediatrics, Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California
2018 President, American Academy of Pediatrics
Division of General Pediatrics, Children's Hospital Los Angeles

, Paediatrician FAHMS MBChB FRACP MD GradDip Obst & Gynae
Scientific Director, GenV & Group Leader, Prevention Innovation
Professorial Fellow, Department of Paediatrics, The University of Melbourne
Honorary Professor, Dept of Paediatrics & Liggins Institute, The University of Auckland
Group Leader, Murdoch Children's Research Institute