Helen Colhoun is Professor of Public Health at the University of Dundee and Honorary Consultant in Public Health NHS Fife. She joined the University of Dundee and NHS Fife in September 2007 having previously held tenured professorial posts in epidemiology at University College London and University College Dublin. Her major research interest is the epidemiology, including genetic epidemiology, of diabetes and its complications. Her previous observational and clinical trial research has improved understanding of the pathogenesis and means to prevent vascular disease in diabetes and has changed clinical guidelines. She leads a  core team of four statisticians, three epidemiologists and a database programmer.  Her current research programme includes

• Discovery and validation studies  for biomarkers of diabetic complications:  Professor Colhoun  leads the non-genetic biomarker workpackage (€10 million)  of the €30 million EU Innovative Medicines  SUMMIT programme.  
• Studies that harness the power of Scottish data-linkage systems and clinical databases to study the epidemiology of diabetes complications and the safety of drugs: Professor Colhoun leads the pharmacovigilance workpackage of the   Wellcome Trust  funded  Scottish Health Informatics Programme and  contributes to the diabetes epidemiology workpackage and the  core  research programme on provisioning datasets for research.
• Developing new clinical trials in diabetes patients: Professor Colhoun is deputy PI of the JDRF funded trial of metformin in type 1 diabetes ($3.4 million).
• Creating then using a large bioresource to research complications of type 1 diabetes: Professor Colhoun is the PI of the CSO and DUK funded Scottish Diabetes Research Network Type 1 Bioresource.
• Large-scale genetic epidemiology studies.  These include studies  of  genetic determinants of diabetic nephropathy in both type 1 diabetes (in the Eurodiab Family Study cohort) and type 2 diabetes (in the Wellcome Trust Type 2 Diabetes Case-Control Collection in Tayside),   and genome-wide association studies of  intermediate phenotypes relevant to cardiovascular disease in diabetes and  of statin response in the (Collaborative Atorvastatin Diabetes Study  CARDS).

She is currently Associate Editor of Diabetologia and sits on a number of grant body panels including the Wellcome Trust Birth Cohorts Committee and was previously on the Wellcome Tust Study Design Panel.  She contributes to major  academic led clinical trials in diabetes ; currently participating  in the Phase 3A Steering committee for a new PCSK9 inhibitor , the design and operations committee for a new GLP-1 analogue CVD endpoint trial and various trial  DSMB  committees.