T he HRB Centre for Health and Diet Research provides anational focal point for public

health nutrition research in theRepublic of Ireland. The centre wasestablished in 2008 with fundingsupport from the Irish HealthResearch Board (HRB) and the IrishDepartment of Agriculture, Fisheriesand Food. In a recent internationalpeer review exercise the centre wasdescribed as ‘flourishing’ and thepanel considered ‘the unique mix ofpeople, backgrounds and skills to bea real strength and perhaps unique inEurope’. The centre, which is led byProfessor Ivan Perry, Department ofEpidemiology & Public Health,University College Cork (UCC), isbased on inter-institutional collabora-tion between University College Cork(UCC), University College Dublin(UCD), the Institute of Public Healthin Ireland, the University of Ulster andTeagasc Food Research Centre. Thecentre draws on expertise from awide range of academic disciplinesacross these institutions, includingnutrition, public health, foodmarketing, consumer behaviour,obstetrics and endocrinology. It hasdeveloped formal links with nationalagencies and stakeholders working infood and health, including safefoodIreland, the Irish Health ServiceExecutive and the Department ofHealth. The centre also works withinternational partners including theCentre of Excellence for Public Health(NI), Queens University Belfast,Centre of Epidemiology andBiostatistics, Leeds Institute ofGenetics, Health and Therapeuticsand the Centre for Diet and ActivityResearch (CEDAR), at the Institute ofPublic Health, University of Cambridge.

The mission of the centre is todevelop a sustainable national inter-institutional and interagency

consortium, focused on promotingthe health and wellbeing of the Irishpopulation by producing and effectivelydisseminating high quality evidenceto guide practice and policy in thearea of public health nutrition. Thework of the centre is focused onstrengthening the evidence base forthe prevention and management ofobesity, diabetes and related meta-bolic disorders, and increasing ourunderstanding of the determinantsand modifiers of food choice andother food related behaviours. Thecentre is committed to working withEnterprise Ireland and other relevantagencies and partners to develop tech-nologies to support healthy choicesand the maintenance/achievement ofhealthy weight in children and adults,and to strengthening Ireland’s

capacity in public health nutritionthrough internationally competitive,inter-institutional Master’s anddoctoral level training.

‘The centre draws onexpertise from a widerange of academicdisciplines…’

The specific objectives of the centreare addressed in five discrete butinterlinked research clusters spanningpopulation-based, clinical, transla-tional and policy relevant researchprojects, using quantitative and quali-tative research methodologies andwithin the framework of researchdesigns employed in health and socialsciences, including market/consumerbehaviour research.

Nutrition, public health, foodmarketing, consumer behaviour,obstetrics and endocrinology…

The health and wellbeingof the Irish population

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1 Public Service Review: European Science & Technology: issue 11

Fig 1

Cluster 1: Population HealthModelling (Professor KevinBalanda, Institute of Public Healthin Ireland, Professor Ivan Perry,UCC) – the primary objectives for thisresearch cluster are to provide a critical research base for the estab-lishment of an Obesity Observatory forIreland. Drawing on the existing Irishpublic health nutrition infrastructureand data resources and on new dataand outputs from the centre, we arealso working on statistical ‘PopulationPrevalence Models’ for diabetes andother nutrition related chronic condi-tions and on a National Burden ofDisease (NBD) study in Ireland,focused on obesity and nutritionrelated risk factors.

Cluster 2: Diet, obesity and health in pregnancy and childhood(Professor Cecily Kelleher, UCD,and Professor Fionnuala McAuliffe,UCD and National MaternityHospital) – the focus of work in thiscluster is on the effects of maternaldiet during pregnancy on foetal growthand risk of obesity in childhood. Thework programme includes a series ofanalyses of the data from an existinginter-generational antenatal cohortstudy (Lifeways Cohort Study); and alarge randomised controlled trial ofthe impact of a low glycaemic diet

intervention on the prevention ofrecurrence of macrosomia in pregnancy.

Cluster 3: Diet, obesity and healthin adults (Professor Ivan Perry andDr Catherine Philips, UCC) – thisresearch programme is focused on theestimation of the effects of specificdietary exposures and dietary patternson prevalence, incidence and popula-tion trends in obesity, the metabolicsyndrome, Type 2 diabetes and major CVD endpoints in linked cross-sectional and longitudinal studiesinvolving representative samples ofmiddle-aged men and women.

‘It has developedformal links withnational agencies and stakeholdersworking in food andhealth, includingsafefood Ireland, theIrish Health ServiceExecutive and theDepartment of Health.’

Cluster 4: Management of MorbidObesity (Dr Donal O’Shea, UCD) –we have established a national obesitycohort based on a database of theseverely obese adult and paediatric

patients referred to all specialisthospital centres for obesity in Ireland.This database is providing a platformfor quality assurance in the manage-ment of morbid obesity in the Republicof Ireland and it supports recruitment ofpatients into randomised clinical trials.

Cluster 5: Consumer cognitiveresponse to food (Dr MaryMcCarthy, UCC, and ProfessorPatrick Wall, UCD) – the focus ofthis research programme is onconsumer cognitive response to food,including the socio-demographic,psychological, physiological andhealth status factors that driveconsumer food choice.

The work of the HRB Centre for Health and Diet Research forms partof a larger national and Europeanframework in food and healthresearch (see Fig. 1).

Professor Ivan PerryHead

Department of Epidemiology andPublic HealthUniversity College CorkBrookfield Health Science ComplexCollege RoadCork

Tel: +353 (0)21 490 1588

i.perry@ucc.iewww.ucc.ie/en.hrbcwww.ucc.ie

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2Public Service Review: European Science & Technology: issue 11

Professor Ivan Perry, Head