Dr Ibrahim Bou Orm is a Lecturer within the Institution for Global Health and Development Division at Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh.
- Overview
- Research Interests
- Research Publications
- Teaching & Learning
- Funded Projects
Ibrahim Bou-Orm is a medical doctor by training, with more than 5 years of experience in global public health research and practice. In 2017, Ibrahim worked for the Lebanese Ministry of Health as Public Health consultant on Non-Communicable Disease (NCD) Prevention and Control and Refugee Health and took later a lectureship in Public Health at the Faculty of Medicine at St. Joseph University of Beirut.
He joined IGHD in 2018 for an NIHR-funded doctoral fellowship in global health, as part of the NIHR Research Unit on Health in Situations of Fragility (NIHR RUHF), exploring the political economy of NCD prevention and control and investigating the response of Lebanon’s systems for health to NCDs. He also assisted the RUHF research work in Sierra Leone and Northern Ghana and most recently led research projects on health service delivery and private sector engagement in the conflict area of Northern Syria. Ibrahim is now a Lecturer in Global Health and Development at IGHD and member of both the teaching team and the health systems cluster.
Dr Bou-Orm holds an MD from St. Joseph University of Beirut and an MPH from the CEPH-accredited Public Health programme at the American University of Beirut (AUB), and he just defended his PhD thesis at QMU Edinburgh.
Ibrahim’s current research covers a wide range of global health priorities and explores both health and community systems dynamics towards their prevention and control. In recent years, he has worked on investigating health systems in fragile and conflict-affected settings in the Middle East and Africa, with a special attention to service delivery, political economy of health and health system governance. Dr Bou-Orm also led research projects to investigate cancer screening behaviours in Lebanon and the burden of non-communicable diseases such as diabetes as a high-burden disease in Lebanon and their risk factors. His research portfolio has relied on different research approaches and methods including systems thinking, health policy and political economy analysis as well as quantitative methods and mixed-methods. He is also affiliated to the UK-FCDO funded project ReBUILD for Resilience exploring health system resilience in fragile settings.
Active research interests:
- Health Systems in Fragile and Conflict-affected Settings
- Non-Communicable Disease (NCD) Prevention and Control
- Universal Health Coverage and Primary Healthcare
Research Methods:
- Participatory research methods
- Political economy analysis
- Quantitative methods
- Evidence synthesis
- Mixed-methods
Ibrahim coordinates modules within the IGHD Masters Programme on Health Systems, Services and Communities (HSSC) as well as Research Proposal Writing (RPW). He also contributes to other modules such as Global Health Research (GHR).
Community perceptions of primary care service delivery in Northern Syria: exploring the role of the private sector
This study aims to assess service utilization among community members in Northern Syria across different health providers. It will generate evidence on the main sources of healthcare in the region and the interaction of communities with different sectors to address their health needs. The project builds on a growing collaborative work with UOSSM France and other partners in Northern Syria.
Exploring approaches for complementary private sector engagement in the health sector in Northern Syria
In collaboration with UOSSM France, this project aims to explore more sustainable and long-term approaches to health service provision by engaging (or not) the private sector in the provision of health services. In addition to knowledge generation, this research grant would inform heath actors in the conflict zone of Syria about best practices to serve communities during this crisis and beyond.
Learn more about this project here.
Assessment of the provision of Mental Health Psychosocial Support (MHPSS) services to health workers and community members in Northwest Syria
Funded by WHO Europe, this project explored the responsiveness of MHPSS services towards host communities, internally displaced persons, and health care workers with a special focus on access to MHPSS care, as well as experiences of service users. This work also aimed to identify how to improve integration of services for better continuum of care, service efficiency and person-centeredness.
A blog about a presentation of key findings is available here.
Rebuild for Resilience
ReBUILD for Resilience examines health systems in fragile settings experiencing violence, conflict, pandemics and other shocks. Our aim is to produce high-quality, practical, multidisciplinary and scalable health systems research which can be used to build health systems resilience and improve the health and lives of many millions of people.
