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Professor Dame Valerie Beral

Professor Dame Valerie Beral

Contact information


http://www.ceu.ox.ac.uk

Valerie Beral

DBE, AC, FRS, 1946-2022

Emeritus Professor of Epidemiology

Valerie Beral studied medicine at Sydney University, Australia. After a few years of clinical work in Australia, New Guinea and the UK, she spent almost 20 years at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine working in the Department of Epidemiology.

In 1989 she became the Director of the Cancer Epidemiology Unit in Oxford. A major focus of her work was the role of reproductive, hormonal and infectious agents in cancer; she was Principal Investigator for the Million Women Study cohort of women’s health, and led international collaborative studies of breast, ovarian and endometrial cancer. 

Her more recent research was broadly aimed at understanding the major modifiable causes of morbidity and mortality associated with ageing in women, using the wealth of personal data collected from participants in the Million Women study cohort in combination with routinely-collected information on disease outcomes from linked NHS medical records. These studies also included work on the causes of heart attack, stroke and blood clots, osteoporosis, fracture, and dementia.

Read Valerie’s obituary.