Karen O’Neill

BNurs(Hons) 2003; MA Humanitarianism and Conflict Response 2012 – senior nurse experienced in emergency care and humanitarian aid.

Karen O’Neill graduated from the University of Manchester with a Bachelor of Nursing (Hons) in 2003. Since then, her time has been split between emergency-department nursing across Greater Manchester and humanitarian aid and disaster response overseas.

In 2009, Karen began an eight-month spell working as a volunteer nurse at a hospital in Gulu, Uganda. Later, she returned to the hospital to deliver teaching on acute illness management and nursing skills. More recently, she travelled to the country’s south-west with the charity Medcare, who run a paediatric healthcare centre and programmes to support children with chronic illnesses.

As a member of the UK International Emergency Trauma Register (UKIETR), Karen was deployed to the Philippines with Save the Children in late 2013 after typhoon Haiyan devastated much of the country. With help from the British Navy, her team spent two weeks visiting remote islands and attending to the emergency medical needs of the local population. Her role with the UKIETR has also seen her participate in training in Mumbai’s inner-city slums.

Karen’s more recent experience includes working for the non-governmental organisation UK-Med as a medical adviser on the National Ebola Response Programme. Her role with UK-Med evolved, and she later led the training of UK clinicians in Malawi. She also helped with the provision and training of on-call emergency medical teams to respond to global humanitarian disasters.

In 2012, Karen completed a masters degree in humanitarianism and conflict response at the University of Manchester.