Dr Hamish Foster

  • Clinical Research Fellow (General Practice & Primary Care)

Biography

I am a General Practitioner and a Clinical Research Fellow based in the General Practice and Primary Care research group (GPPC). I am interested in health and social inequalities, lifestyle/health behaviours, obesity, physical activity, and mixed methods. 

Current Research

My current research interest focusses on the socioeconomic influence on combinations of lifestyle/health behaviours and associated adverse health - the topic of my PhD.

I am currently funded by CSO, on an NRS Career Ressearcher Fellowship to 1) perform analyses of HUNT Databank (Norway) to examine the risks of combinations of health behaviours across the socieoconomic spectrum and their trajectories over time and 2) conduct pilot work with key stakeholders to develop a digital healthy living tool that will provide lifestyle risk information and link people to local resources.

I am also working on a qualitative project funded by Royal College of General Practitioners where we are classifying the work of healthy living or the 'prevention burden' - i.e., the work we need to do to make and sustain healthy changes and prevent noncommunicable diseases like dementia, obesity, heart disease, and diabetes.  

Background and Training

I graduated from Barts and the London School of Medicine and Dentistry (2007) after completing an intercalated BSc in Neuroscience (2006). I later gained Membership of the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh (2010) and a Diploma in Tropical Medicine and Hygiene in East Africa (2013). I worked in a rural hospital in Uganda on the edge of the Bwindi Impenetrable Forest (2013-2014) before completing General Practice training (2015). 

I joined GPPC as a GP clinical academic researcher in 2015. I frequently work with an inter-disciplinary group investigating health-related traits, risk factors, and a wide range of health outcomes using UK Biobank. In 2019 I was awarded a Medical Research Council Clinical Research Training Fellowship entitled 'Understanding interactions between lifestyle and deprivation to support policy and intervention development' (grant number MR/T001585/1). 

Clinical work

I work as a General Practitioner at Drs Foster, Logan, and Macdonald Practice, Glasgow.

Research interests

  • Health and social inequalities
  • Lifestyle/Health behaviours
  • Big Data - UK Biobank and HUNT Databank
  • Mixed methodology - systematic review (synthesis without meta-analysis - SWiM), quantitative epidemiology (survival models, variable selection algorithms), qualitative methods (stakeholder focus groups and interviews)
  • Normalisation Process Theory

Publications

Selected publications

Foster, H. M.E. , Celis-Morales, C. A. , Nicholl, B. I. , Petermann, F., Pell, J. P. , Gill, J. M.R. , O'Donnell, C. A. and Mair, F. S. (2018) The effect of socioeconomic deprivation on the association between an extended measurement of unhealthy lifestyle factors and health outcomes: a prospective analysis of the UK Biobank cohort. Lancet Public Health, 3(12), e576-e585. (doi: 10.1016/S2468-2667(18)30200-7) (PMID:30467019)

Foster, H. , Macdonald, S. , Patterson, C. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2019) No such thing as bad publicity? A quantitative content analysis of print media representations of primary care out-of-hours services. BMJ Open, 9(3), e023192. (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2018-023192) (PMID:30910877) (PMCID:PMC6475237)

Foster, H. , Moffat, K., Burns, N. , Gannon, M., Macdonald, S. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2020) What do we know about demand, use and outcomes in primary care out-of-hours services? A systematic scoping review of international literature. BMJ Open, 10, e033481. (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2019-033481) (PMID:31959608)

Foster, H. M.E. , Ho, F. K. , Sattar, N. , Welsh, P. , Pell, J. P. , Gill, J. M.R. , Gray, S. R. and Celis-Morales, C. A. (2020) Understanding how much TV is too much: a non-linear analysis of the association between television viewing time and adverse health outcomes. Mayo Clinic Proceedings, 95(11), pp. 2429-2441. (doi: 10.1016/j.mayocp.2020.04.035) (PMID:32713607)

Foster, H. M.E. , Polz, P., Mair, F. S. , Gill, J. M.R. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2021) Understanding the influence of socioeconomic status on the association between combinations of lifestyle factors and adverse health outcomes: a systematic review protocol. BMJ Open, 11, e042212. (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2020-042212) (PMID:34045211) (PMCID:PMC8162079)

McQueenie, R. et al. (2020) Multimorbidity, polypharmacy, and COVID-19 infection within the UK Biobank cohort. PLoS ONE, 15(8), e0238091. (doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0238091) (PMID:32817712) (PMCID:PMC7440632)

All publications

List by: Type | Date

Jump to: 2024 | 2023 | 2022 | 2021 | 2020 | 2019 | 2018 | 2015 | 2013 | 2012
Number of items: 23.

2024

Foster, H. M.E. , Mair, F. S. and O'Donnell, K. A. (2024) Exploring public, practitioner and policymaker perspectives of unhealthy lifestyle factors in the context of socioeconomic deprivation: a qualitative study. Health Expectations, 27(5), e70069. (doi: 10.1111/hex.70069) (PMID:39445797) (PMCID:PMC11500207)

2023

Foster, H. M.E. , Polz, P., Gill, J. M.R. , Celis-Morales, C. , Mair, F. S. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2023) The influence of socioeconomic status on the association between unhealthy lifestyle factors and adverse health outcomes: A systematic review. Wellcome Open Research, 8, 55. (doi: 10.12688/wellcomeopenres.18708.2)

Foster, H. M.E. , Gill, J. M.R. , Mair, F. S. , Celis-Morales, C. A. , Jani, B. D. , Nicholl, B. I. , Lee, D. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2023) Social connection and mortality in UK Biobank: a prospective cohort analysis. BMC Medicine, 21, 384. (doi: 10.1186/s12916-023-03055-7) (PMID:37946218) (PMCID:PMC10637015)

Hastie, C. E. , Foster, H. M.E. , Jani, B. D. , O'Donnell, C. A. , Ho, F. K. , Pell, J. P. , Sattar, N. , Katikireddi, S. V. , Mair, F. S. and Nicholl, B. I. (2023) Chronic pain and COVID-19 hospitalisation and mortality: a UK Biobank cohort study. Pain, 164(1), pp. 84-90. (doi: 10.1097/j.pain.0000000000002663) (PMID:35452027) (PMCID:PMC9756431)

2022

Huang, C., Foster, H. , Paudyal, V., Ward, M. and Lowrie, R. (2022) A systematic review of the nutritional status of adults experiencing homelessness. Public Health, 208, pp. 59-67. (doi: 10.1016/j.puhe.2022.04.013) (PMID:35716429)

Foster, H. M.E. et al. (2022) The association between a lifestyle score, socioeconomic status, and COVID-19 outcomes within the UK Biobank cohort. BMC Infectious Diseases, 22, 273. (doi: 10.1186/s12879-022-07132-9) (PMID:35351028) (PMCID:PMC8964028)

2021

Jani, B. D. et al. (2021) Family history of diabetes and risk of SARS-COV-2 in UK Biobank: a prospective cohort study. Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, 4(4), e00283. (doi: 10.1002/edm2.283) (PMID:34505416) (PMCID:PMC8420405)

Foster, H. M.E. , Polz, P., Mair, F. S. , Gill, J. M.R. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2021) Understanding the influence of socioeconomic status on the association between combinations of lifestyle factors and adverse health outcomes: a systematic review protocol. BMJ Open, 11, e042212. (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2020-042212) (PMID:34045211) (PMCID:PMC8162079)

2020

Petermann-Rocha, F. et al. (2020) Comparison of two different frailty measurements and risk of hospitalisation or death from COVID-19: findings from UK Biobank. BMC Medicine, 18, 355. (doi: 10.1186/s12916-020-01822-4) (PMID:33167965) (PMCID:PMC7652674)

Ho, F. K. et al. (2020) Is older age associated with COVID-19 mortality in the absence of other risk factors? General population cohort study of 470,034 participants. PLoS ONE, 15(11), e0241824. (doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0241824) (PMID:33152008) (PMCID:PMC7644030)

Foster, H. M.E. , Ho, F. K. , Sattar, N. , Welsh, P. , Pell, J. P. , Gill, J. M.R. , Gray, S. R. and Celis-Morales, C. A. (2020) Understanding how much TV is too much: a non-linear analysis of the association between television viewing time and adverse health outcomes. Mayo Clinic Proceedings, 95(11), pp. 2429-2441. (doi: 10.1016/j.mayocp.2020.04.035) (PMID:32713607)

McQueenie, R. et al. (2020) Multimorbidity, polypharmacy, and COVID-19 infection within the UK Biobank cohort. PLoS ONE, 15(8), e0238091. (doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0238091) (PMID:32817712) (PMCID:PMC7440632)

Ho, F. K. et al. (2020) Associations of fat and carbohydrate intake with cardiovascular disease and mortality: prospective cohort study of UK Biobank participants. British Medical Journal, 368(8238), m688. (doi: 10.1136/bmj.m688) (PMID:32188587)

Foster, H. , Moffat, K., Burns, N. , Gannon, M., Macdonald, S. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2020) What do we know about demand, use and outcomes in primary care out-of-hours services? A systematic scoping review of international literature. BMJ Open, 10, e033481. (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2019-033481) (PMID:31959608)

Mair, F. S. , Foster, H. M.E. and Nicholl, B. I. (2020) Multimorbidity and the COVID-19 pandemic – an urgent call to action. Journal of Comorbidity, 10, pp. 1-2. (doi: 10.1177/2235042X20961676) (PMID:33117721) (PMCID:PMC7573706)

Rey-Lopez, J. P., Ho, F. K.W. , Foster, H. M.E. , Petermann-Rocha, F., Sattar, N. , Pell, J. P. , Gill, J. M.R. , Gray, S. R. and Celis-Morales, C. A. (2020) Does the association between physical capability and mortality differ by deprivation? Findings from the UK Biobank population-based cohort study. Journal of Sports Sciences, 38(23), pp. 2732-2739. (doi: 10.1080/02640414.2020.1797438) (PMID:32723006)

2019

Foster, H. , Macdonald, S. , Patterson, C. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2019) No such thing as bad publicity? A quantitative content analysis of print media representations of primary care out-of-hours services. BMJ Open, 9(3), e023192. (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2018-023192) (PMID:30910877) (PMCID:PMC6475237)

2018

Foster, H. M.E. , Celis-Morales, C. A. , Nicholl, B. I. , Petermann, F., Pell, J. P. , Gill, J. M.R. , O'Donnell, C. A. and Mair, F. S. (2018) The effect of socioeconomic deprivation on the association between an extended measurement of unhealthy lifestyle factors and health outcomes: a prospective analysis of the UK Biobank cohort. Lancet Public Health, 3(12), e576-e585. (doi: 10.1016/S2468-2667(18)30200-7) (PMID:30467019)

O’Donnell, C. A. and Foster, H. (2018) Changing practice in primary care. In: Irving, Kate, Hogervorst, Eef, Oliveira, Deborah and Kivipelto, Miia (eds.) New Developments in Dementia Prevention Research. Taylor and Francis: London. ISBN 9781351122719

Wilcox, M. et al. (2018) Circumstances of child deaths in Mali and Uganda: a community-based confidential enquiry. Lancet Global Health, 6(6), e691-e702. (doi: 10.1016/S2214-109X(18)30215-8) (PMID:29773123)

2015

O'Donnell, C. A. , Foster, H. , Macdonald, S. , Burns, N. and Gannon, M. (2015) Out-of-Hours Primary Medical Care: What Can Research Tell Us? Findings From a Rapid Systematic Review and Qualitative Study. [Research Reports or Papers]

2013

Guerrier, G., Foster, H. , Metge, O., Chouvin, C. and Tui, M. (2013) Cultural contexts of swine-related infections in Polynesia. Clinical Microbiology and Infection, 19(7), pp. 595-599. (doi: 10.1111/1469-0691.12088) (PMID:23194348)

2012

Aldridge, C., Foster, H. M.E. , Albonico, M., Ame, S. and Montresor, A. (2012) Evaluation of the diagnostic accuracy of the Haemoglobin Colour Scale to detect anaemia in young children attending primary healthcare clinics in Zanzibar. Tropical Medicine and International Health, 17(4), pp. 423-429. (doi: 10.1111/j.1365-3156.2011.02944.x) (PMID:22296167)

This list was generated on Tue Mar 25 15:27:26 2025 GMT.
Jump to: Articles | Book Sections | Research Reports or Papers
Number of items: 23.

Articles

Foster, H. M.E. , Mair, F. S. and O'Donnell, K. A. (2024) Exploring public, practitioner and policymaker perspectives of unhealthy lifestyle factors in the context of socioeconomic deprivation: a qualitative study. Health Expectations, 27(5), e70069. (doi: 10.1111/hex.70069) (PMID:39445797) (PMCID:PMC11500207)

Foster, H. M.E. , Polz, P., Gill, J. M.R. , Celis-Morales, C. , Mair, F. S. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2023) The influence of socioeconomic status on the association between unhealthy lifestyle factors and adverse health outcomes: A systematic review. Wellcome Open Research, 8, 55. (doi: 10.12688/wellcomeopenres.18708.2)

Foster, H. M.E. , Gill, J. M.R. , Mair, F. S. , Celis-Morales, C. A. , Jani, B. D. , Nicholl, B. I. , Lee, D. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2023) Social connection and mortality in UK Biobank: a prospective cohort analysis. BMC Medicine, 21, 384. (doi: 10.1186/s12916-023-03055-7) (PMID:37946218) (PMCID:PMC10637015)

Hastie, C. E. , Foster, H. M.E. , Jani, B. D. , O'Donnell, C. A. , Ho, F. K. , Pell, J. P. , Sattar, N. , Katikireddi, S. V. , Mair, F. S. and Nicholl, B. I. (2023) Chronic pain and COVID-19 hospitalisation and mortality: a UK Biobank cohort study. Pain, 164(1), pp. 84-90. (doi: 10.1097/j.pain.0000000000002663) (PMID:35452027) (PMCID:PMC9756431)

Huang, C., Foster, H. , Paudyal, V., Ward, M. and Lowrie, R. (2022) A systematic review of the nutritional status of adults experiencing homelessness. Public Health, 208, pp. 59-67. (doi: 10.1016/j.puhe.2022.04.013) (PMID:35716429)

Foster, H. M.E. et al. (2022) The association between a lifestyle score, socioeconomic status, and COVID-19 outcomes within the UK Biobank cohort. BMC Infectious Diseases, 22, 273. (doi: 10.1186/s12879-022-07132-9) (PMID:35351028) (PMCID:PMC8964028)

Jani, B. D. et al. (2021) Family history of diabetes and risk of SARS-COV-2 in UK Biobank: a prospective cohort study. Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism, 4(4), e00283. (doi: 10.1002/edm2.283) (PMID:34505416) (PMCID:PMC8420405)

Foster, H. M.E. , Polz, P., Mair, F. S. , Gill, J. M.R. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2021) Understanding the influence of socioeconomic status on the association between combinations of lifestyle factors and adverse health outcomes: a systematic review protocol. BMJ Open, 11, e042212. (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2020-042212) (PMID:34045211) (PMCID:PMC8162079)

Petermann-Rocha, F. et al. (2020) Comparison of two different frailty measurements and risk of hospitalisation or death from COVID-19: findings from UK Biobank. BMC Medicine, 18, 355. (doi: 10.1186/s12916-020-01822-4) (PMID:33167965) (PMCID:PMC7652674)

Ho, F. K. et al. (2020) Is older age associated with COVID-19 mortality in the absence of other risk factors? General population cohort study of 470,034 participants. PLoS ONE, 15(11), e0241824. (doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0241824) (PMID:33152008) (PMCID:PMC7644030)

Foster, H. M.E. , Ho, F. K. , Sattar, N. , Welsh, P. , Pell, J. P. , Gill, J. M.R. , Gray, S. R. and Celis-Morales, C. A. (2020) Understanding how much TV is too much: a non-linear analysis of the association between television viewing time and adverse health outcomes. Mayo Clinic Proceedings, 95(11), pp. 2429-2441. (doi: 10.1016/j.mayocp.2020.04.035) (PMID:32713607)

McQueenie, R. et al. (2020) Multimorbidity, polypharmacy, and COVID-19 infection within the UK Biobank cohort. PLoS ONE, 15(8), e0238091. (doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0238091) (PMID:32817712) (PMCID:PMC7440632)

Ho, F. K. et al. (2020) Associations of fat and carbohydrate intake with cardiovascular disease and mortality: prospective cohort study of UK Biobank participants. British Medical Journal, 368(8238), m688. (doi: 10.1136/bmj.m688) (PMID:32188587)

Foster, H. , Moffat, K., Burns, N. , Gannon, M., Macdonald, S. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2020) What do we know about demand, use and outcomes in primary care out-of-hours services? A systematic scoping review of international literature. BMJ Open, 10, e033481. (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2019-033481) (PMID:31959608)

Mair, F. S. , Foster, H. M.E. and Nicholl, B. I. (2020) Multimorbidity and the COVID-19 pandemic – an urgent call to action. Journal of Comorbidity, 10, pp. 1-2. (doi: 10.1177/2235042X20961676) (PMID:33117721) (PMCID:PMC7573706)

Rey-Lopez, J. P., Ho, F. K.W. , Foster, H. M.E. , Petermann-Rocha, F., Sattar, N. , Pell, J. P. , Gill, J. M.R. , Gray, S. R. and Celis-Morales, C. A. (2020) Does the association between physical capability and mortality differ by deprivation? Findings from the UK Biobank population-based cohort study. Journal of Sports Sciences, 38(23), pp. 2732-2739. (doi: 10.1080/02640414.2020.1797438) (PMID:32723006)

Foster, H. , Macdonald, S. , Patterson, C. and O'Donnell, C. A. (2019) No such thing as bad publicity? A quantitative content analysis of print media representations of primary care out-of-hours services. BMJ Open, 9(3), e023192. (doi: 10.1136/bmjopen-2018-023192) (PMID:30910877) (PMCID:PMC6475237)

Foster, H. M.E. , Celis-Morales, C. A. , Nicholl, B. I. , Petermann, F., Pell, J. P. , Gill, J. M.R. , O'Donnell, C. A. and Mair, F. S. (2018) The effect of socioeconomic deprivation on the association between an extended measurement of unhealthy lifestyle factors and health outcomes: a prospective analysis of the UK Biobank cohort. Lancet Public Health, 3(12), e576-e585. (doi: 10.1016/S2468-2667(18)30200-7) (PMID:30467019)

Wilcox, M. et al. (2018) Circumstances of child deaths in Mali and Uganda: a community-based confidential enquiry. Lancet Global Health, 6(6), e691-e702. (doi: 10.1016/S2214-109X(18)30215-8) (PMID:29773123)

Guerrier, G., Foster, H. , Metge, O., Chouvin, C. and Tui, M. (2013) Cultural contexts of swine-related infections in Polynesia. Clinical Microbiology and Infection, 19(7), pp. 595-599. (doi: 10.1111/1469-0691.12088) (PMID:23194348)

Aldridge, C., Foster, H. M.E. , Albonico, M., Ame, S. and Montresor, A. (2012) Evaluation of the diagnostic accuracy of the Haemoglobin Colour Scale to detect anaemia in young children attending primary healthcare clinics in Zanzibar. Tropical Medicine and International Health, 17(4), pp. 423-429. (doi: 10.1111/j.1365-3156.2011.02944.x) (PMID:22296167)

Book Sections

O’Donnell, C. A. and Foster, H. (2018) Changing practice in primary care. In: Irving, Kate, Hogervorst, Eef, Oliveira, Deborah and Kivipelto, Miia (eds.) New Developments in Dementia Prevention Research. Taylor and Francis: London. ISBN 9781351122719

Research Reports or Papers

O'Donnell, C. A. , Foster, H. , Macdonald, S. , Burns, N. and Gannon, M. (2015) Out-of-Hours Primary Medical Care: What Can Research Tell Us? Findings From a Rapid Systematic Review and Qualitative Study. [Research Reports or Papers]

This list was generated on Tue Mar 25 15:27:26 2025 GMT.

Grants

Grants and Awards listed are those received whilst working with the University of Glasgow.

  • Developing a theory of prevention burden
    Royal College of General Practitioners
    2024 - 2026
     
  • Developing a healthy living score tool with and for communities affected by socioeconomic deprivation.
    Office of the Chief Scientific Adviser
    2024 - 2027
     

Dr Hamish Foster on Twitter