Lucy Selman

I am a social scientist specialising in palliative and end of life care. I have specific interests in how clinicians communicate about death and dying, psycho-social aspects of illness and care, grief and bereavement, and public health approaches to improving end-of-life care and bereavement support.

Since 2020 I have been Founding Director of Good Grief Festival, a public engagement and grief literacy initiative which has now engaged 30,000+ people.

I joined the Department of Population Health Sciences at the University of Bristol in January 2016. Before my current post I worked for ten years as a researcher at the Cicely Saunders Institute, King's College London.

During my career I have conducted and coordinated research in palliative and end of life care across primary, tertiary and community settings in the UK, India, South Africa, Uganda, Kenya and the USA. My research has focused on a range of life-limiting health conditions and the experiences of patients, family caregivers and healthcare professionals, aiming to inform the delivery of healthcare and the development and evaluation of interventions. I am currently conducting an NIHR Career Development Fellowship focused on staff-patient communication in advanced kidney disease.

Before moving into health research, I studied Philosophy, completing an MPhil specialising in Philosophy of Science in 2003. My research is often interdisciplinary, and uses mainly qualitative and mixed research methodologies.