Professor Tracey Howe

Tracey is known for her high energy, strategic visioning, and creative problem-solving, and for creating vibrant, multi-disciplinary environments, through collaboration, partnerships, and relationships, that empower others to succeed.

Throughout her career Tracey has been actively engaged in developing and driving forward new innovative high quality cross institutional research and education initiatives and delivering high impact, quality outputs. These include amongst others; a UK satellite for the Cochrane Musculoskeletal Group, The Cochrane Healthcare of Older People Field, HealthQWest, the Postgraduate Institute for Health and Social Care, University of Teesside, the Centre for Rehabilitation Science, University of Manchester and Teesside Centre for Rehabilitation Science.

Tracey is an internationally recognised Professor of Rehabilitation Science with considerable experience of the organisation, promotion and growth of research and postgraduate activity. This is evidenced through her leadership and delivery of a highly successful multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional 2008 RAE return. She was founding Director of HealthQWest, an award winning innovative research consortium for the West of Scotland, set up with significant financial backing (£5.7M) from four Scottish Government organisations and five Universities.

She has served on numerous national and international scientific panels and committees including; REF2014, REF Expert Advisory Group, RAE2008, International Evaluator for the Research Assessment Exercise for the Romanian Government and Chair of the Clinical and Health & Social Care Research & Development (HSC R&D) Doctoral Fellowship Evaluation Panels, Northern Ireland.

Tracey began her career as a Chartered Physiotherapist and spent several years working in various multi disciplinary environments. She wanted to make a contribution to the newly emerging area of evidence-based medicine and so in a five year period, two of which she was working full time as a clinician, she gained an MSc from the University of Liverpool, a PhD from the Faculty of Medicine, University of Manchester and a CertEd from Liverpool John Moore’s University.

Continued personal development is central to Tracey’s ethos and she has completed several intensive leadership programmes including, the prestigious Top Manager Programme and the ATHENA Leadership Programme both at the King’s Fund, London. She regularly attends, and contributes to, other events and activities such as the Scottish Researcher Career Coordination Forum.

She lives with her family in Glasgow, Scotland.