MRC Epidemiology UnitSenior Research Associate
Diet and Physical Activity Interventions in Patient Populations, Nutrition Measurement Platform
Current work and interests
Kirsten Rennie leads the development of physical activity measurement for the Measurement Platform and studies in secondary care for the Diet and Physical Activity Interventions in Patient Populations programme.
Her work focuses on the incorporation of remote monitoring in population-based and patient studies, including apps and wearables with the aim of improving clinical pathways and health outcomes in paediatrics and adults. Kirsten is particularly interested how remote monitoring of heart rate, physical activity patterning and function can be used to identify individuals who are at risk of adverse health outcomes or to assess changes in treatment.
Kirsten is Assistant Teaching Professor in Department of Engineering for the MSt Healthcare Innovation Programme and supervises Masters and PhD students.
Background and experience
Kirsten has worked as an epidemiologist in both academic and industry settings, including MRC Human Nutrition Research, Oxon epidemiology, UBC, Unilever, University College London and University of Ulster. Her previous work has included the development of objective measurements of physical activity into large-scale studies such as wave form accelerometry and heart rate monitoring. This involved applying these measurements in observational studies of metabolic diseases with other measures of physical activity and dietary behaviour. Kirsten has also evaluated lifestyle interventions in weight management programmes and worked on pharmaco-epidemiology safety and effectiveness studies in large-scale patient studies.
Kirsten received a MA in Biological Anthropology (1995), MPhil in Epidemiology (1997) and PhD in physical activity epidemiology (2000) from the University of Cambridge. She is a UK registered nutritionist (Association for Nutrition, Public Health specialty). She holds an honorary research contract with Cambridge University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, a Public Health Academic Contract with the Department of Health and Social Care and is a Visiting Research Fellow at the Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge in the Health Systems Design research group.
Recent studies
REACT-KID is a study exploring how wearable technology can support kidney transplant assessments and outcomes. Within this study we are assessing the use of a wrist-worn device with combined sensors to objectively measure physical activity and heart rate in 200 patients before transplant and again four months after their kidney transplant.
Cambridge Metabolic Reference Study assesses heart rate and movement behaviours in healthy children and adults using wearables to provide reference data to evaluate these metrics in patients. This is a study in collaboration with Dr Laura Watson at the NIHR Cambridge Clinical Research Facility and NIHR Bioresource Centre Cambridge.
Patients with resistance to Thyroid Hormone: As part of the rare thyroid disorder programme led by Prof Krishna Chatterjee, we are taking serial measurements of free-living heart rate and physical activity using wearables to assess how changes in these metrics relate to before and during treatment regimens in both paediatric and adult patients.
AMALGAM is a feasibility study to assess the integration of wearable accelerometer data with machine learning for enhancing osteoarthritis diagnosis.
WARD-W study assesses the use of a wrist-worn accelerometer as a remote monitoring technology to objectively measure physical activity in end-stage renal disease patients at home and whether it could be used to identify patients at risk of frailty.
COBALT is a randomised, open-labelled, interventional feasibility study of a proposed multicentre randomised controlled trial. Within this study we are assessing the use and acceptability of a wrist-worn accelerometer to objectively measure physical activity in kidney transplant patients at home and whether it could be used to better characterise changes in activity levels and associated quality of life after a surgical intervention.
Fenland Study is a population-based study currently recruiting to Phase 3 follow-up. Kirsten is the Principal Investigator responsible for the introduction and development of remote data collection and participant health feedback using a bespoke study app.
CREATE-C study tested a remote activity programme tailored for patients with colorectal cancer delivered completely at home and to investigate whether this intervention helps patients during treatment.
Fenland COVID-19 study was a population-based study conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic, using telehealth monitoring of symptoms, biomarkers, health behaviours and using a novel remote blood collection method.