Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health
London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine
Ian Roberts is Professor of Epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. He trained as a paediatrician in the UK and then in epidemiology at the University of Auckland, New Zealand and McGill University, Canada. He is co-ordinating editor of the Cochrane Injuries Group that prepares systematic reviews of the effectiveness of interventions in the prevention, treatment and rehabilitation of injury. He is principal investigator of several large international clinical trials, including the CRASH trials and the WOMAN trial. The CRASH-1 trial, included 10,000 patients with head injury and showed that corticosteroids (which were widely used in the management of head injury) increased the risk of death. The CRASH-2 trial showed that tranexamic acid, an inexpensive and widely practicable treatment, safely reduces mortality in bleeding trauma patients. The WOMAN trial found that tranexamic acid reduces death due to bleeding in women with post-partum haemorrhage. The results from trials have changed clinical practice world-wide.
