Professor Elaine Hay named in the 2025 New Year Honours list
13 January 2025
Versus Arthritis are delighted to pass congratulations to Professor Elaine Hay, who has been named in the 2025 New Year Honours list.
Professor Elaine Hay, whose research on understanding the causes of arthritis and musculoskeletal pain and evaluating new treatments in primary care has been influential around the world, has been awarded an MBE for her services to Medical Research.
Professor Hay is a Versus Arthritis alumni, in 1990 she was awarded an Arthritis Research Campaign Clinical Research Fellowship at the Arthritis Research Campaign Epidemiology Unit in Manchester.
She joined the Haywood Rheumatology Centre and Keele University as Consultant Rheumatologist and Senior Lecturer and became Professor of Community Rheumatology in 2004, taking over from Professor Peter Croft as Director of the Primary Care Centre Versus Arthritis in 2010.
Professor Hay’s clinical trial's research of treatments for back pain, shoulder pain and knee pain have directly informed national guidelines and the Royal College of General Practitioners Musculoskeletal curriculum.
Notably Elaine was the chief investigator of a Versus Arthritis funded trial of a low back pain screening tool called STarTBack which helps GPs and physiotherapists better understand if low back pain will become chronic and to then find tailored treatments.
Professor Hays’ dedication to supporting primary care research careers within her research group has delivered globally recognised UK excellence and expertise in multi-disciplinary non-pharmacological research in musculoskeletal pain and arthritis.
Professor Hay’s leadership roles have included board membership of the National Institute for Health and Care Research’s School for Primary Care and being their Director for Programme Grants for Applied Research between 2018 and 2023. She was Lead of Arthritis Research UK's Musculoskeletal Pain Clinical Studies Group.
In recognition of her contribution to primary care research she was awarded Distinguished Membership of the British Society for Rheumatology in 2016 and Honorary Fellowship of the Royal Society of General Practice in 2017.