Dr Emily Henderson

Dr Emily Henderson is an Academic Consultant Geriatrician with an interest in Parkinson’s disease and related disorders at the Royal United Hospitals, Bath and a Honorary Consultant Senior Lecturer at the University of Bristol. She was awarded a fellowship from Parkinson's-UK and The Association of British Neurologists to undertake a PhD in preventing falls in Parkinson’s. She published the results of this phase II drug trial as first author in Lancet Neurology. She was appointed as a consultant in 2016 and based at the RUH, is PI for commercial and investigator led studies in Parkinson’s, successfully recruiting to time and target. Academically, her research interests lie in gait disorders and cognitive function, movement disorders and clinical trials in older people. She has a translational portfolio of research from basic science models of motor behaviour through to phase II and III clinical trials and service innovation. She is the Chief Investigator of the CHIEF-PD trial. This £2.1 million, NIHR funded, phase III RCT, is a multicentre trial of cholinesterase inhibitors to prevent falls in Parkinson’s with 26 sites across the UK. 

In 2019 she was awarded, as co-Principal Investigator, a £10 million grant from the Gatsby foundation to innovate Parkinson’s care. PRIME-PD is a collaboration with Radboud University in the Netherlands, the University of Bristol and Royal United Hospitals Bath, that shares expertise and facilities to deliver this world-leading research. She is lead for the Complex Medicine in Older People teaching in the new Bristol MB21 Medical School Curriculum. She has been an invited speaker at both national and international meetings. From inception until 2018, she was the Lead for the South West Parkinson’s Excellence Network. She is Lead for Ageing in the West of England Clinical Research Network (CRN). Nationally, she is Immediate past-Chair of the British Geriatric Society - Movement Disorder Section (BGS-MDS), sits on the National Parkinson’s Disease Portfolio Development Group (PD-PDG) and is a Faculty member of the Parkinson's Academy. She is Vice President of Academic Affairs for the British Geriatrics Society.