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Dr Mary Doherty

A head and shoulders of Mary Doherty from BSMS standing in front of a white background and looking at the camera

Dr Mary Doherty (MB BCh BAO, FFARSCI)

Honorary Clinical Research Fellow
E: M.Doherty@bsms.ac.uk
Location: Department of Neuroscience, Brighton and Sussex Medical School, Trafford Building, University of Sussex (but exclusively working remotely).

Academic position: Honorary Clinical Research Fellow

Area of expertise: Neurodiversity in medicine; Autism; Phenomenology; Survey research; Participatory research approaches.

Research areas: Barriers to healthcare access for autistic people; The experiences of autistic psychiatrists.

Personal website >

Twitter: @AutisticDoctor

Biography

Mary is an autistic consultant anaesthetist. She is also the founder of Autistic Doctors International – an organisation dedicated to peer support, advocacy, research, and training. Her academic interests include barriers to healthcare for autistic people, and the experiences of autistic doctors and medical students. With extensive experience of supporting autistic doctors through various workplace challenges, Mary frequently provides autism and neurodiversity training for supervisors, employers, and regulatory bodies.

Research

Mary is an autistic autism researcher. She is experienced in using survey methods, thematic analysis, and qualitative meta-synthesis. She is also currently completing a PhD at London South Bank University, using a qualitative approach, grounded in interpretive phenomenology. This doctoral research is exploring various aspects of the experiences of autistic psychiatrists.

Some examples of other recent projects include:

The experiences of autistic doctors (Principal Investigator).
NHS GPs’ knowledge, attitudes and practices with regards to annual health checks for autistic adults and mandatory autism training.
The experiences of autistic medical students.
Barriers to healthcare for autistic adults.

Mary also has significant experience as an autistic representative (“A-Rep”) on the AIMS-2 Consortium autism trials.

Selected publications

Shaw SCK, Doherty M, Anderson JL. The experiences of autistic medical students: a phenomenological study. Medical Education. 2023. Online ahead of print. Available from: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/medu.15119

Doherty M, McCowan S, Shaw SCK. Autistic SPACE: a novel framework for meeting the needs of autistic people in healthcare settings. British Journal of Hospital Medicine. 2023;84(4):1-9.

Pukki H, Bettin J, Outlaw AG, Hennessy J, Brook K, Dekker M, et al. Autistic perspectives on the future of clinical autism research. Autism in Adulthood. 2022;4(2):93-101.

Johnson M, Doherty M, Shaw SCK. Overcoming barriers to autistic healthcare: towards autism-friendly practices. British Journal of General Practice. 2022;72(719):255-6.

Shaw SCK, Doherty M, McCowan S, Davidson I. Challenging the exclusion of autistic medical students. The Lancet Psychiatry. 2022;9(4):e18.

Doherty M, Neilson S, O’Sullivan J, Carravallah L, Johnson M, Cullen W, Shaw SCK. Barriers to healthcare and self-reported adverse outcomes for autistic adults: a cross-sectional study. British Medical Journal Open. 2022;12:e056904.

Shaw SCK, McCowan S, Doherty M, Grosjean B, Kinnear M. The neurodiversity concept viewed through an autistic lens. The Lancet Psychiatry. 2021;8(8):654-5.