Ms. Mary Bitta

DPhil Candidate, Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford
mbitta@kemri-wellcome.org

Mary is a DPhil candidate at the University of Oxford’s Department of Psychiatry, interested in the epidemiology of psychiatric disorders and in strengthening mental health systems in resource poor settings.  Her recent research has focussed on examining the structure of mental health services in rural Kenya. For her DPhil, Mary is interested in cross-cutting issues around psychiatric genomic research, including the ethics of conducting genomic research in Africa. She is a member of several collaborative initiatives including the Neuropsychiatric Genetics of African Populations-Psychosis (NEUROGAP-P) and the Africa Ethics Working Group (AEWG).

Her Masters in Global Mental Health, awarded by Kings College London and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, UK (2017) examined the epidemiology of suicide in rural Kilifi, Kenya. She had a Bsc. in Nursing from the University of Nairobi (2014).