Lay summary
My background is in investigating the links between the foods we eat and our chance of getting cancer and heart disease in large population studies. For the Sir Charles Hercus Fellowship, I plan to develop big dietary data in a NZ setting. My research will describe food and nutrient intakes in 1000 NZ adults who have heart disease. I will also determine whether it is possible to run a personalised medicine trial in patients with high blood pressure and a common genetic variant. My long-term vision is to establish a study that collects dietary information from NZers and follows them up via linkage to routinely collected health data. My research will develop a tool that will be able to collect dietary information on hundreds of thousands of NZers. I will also be asking the public about their concerns or barriers to linking their dietary data to routinely collected health data.