David Maidment

Biography

David studied at Cardiff University, graduating in 2008 with a BSc degree in Applied Psychology. As part of his degree, David completed a one-year professional placement at Great Ormond Street Hospital and University College London (UCL) Institute of Child Health. During his time in London, he worked with children diagnosed with high-functioning autism, as well as patients with memory and language impairments. David then went on to complete an MSc (2009) and PhD (2013), funded by an Economic & Social Research Council 1+3 studentship. Under the supervision of Dr. Bill Macken, he explored how different modes of speech interact in verbal short-term memory. After his PhD, David worked as a Research Associate within the Auditory Learning team led by Dr. Sygal Amitay at the MRC Institute of Hearing Research. The aim of his research was to develop more effective training programmes that could be applied to the treatment and rehabilitation of disorders associated with auditory processing. Throughout his studies, David has also undertaken a number of volunteer roles. He has worked with children with autism as part of the National Autistic Society's befriending scheme, as well as in adult mental health services at Cardiff and Vale University Health Board (Whitchurch Hospital/Park Road Rehabilitation Unit) and Nottinghamshire NHS Trust (Rampton Hospital). David worked briefly as an Independence Worker for the Mansfield, North Nottinghamshire based charity Jigsaw, offering support to vulnerable people over the age of 60 with dementia. In his current role as a Research Fellow within the Mild to Moderate Hearing Loss team at the NIHR Nottingham BRC, David now intends to bring together his diverse experiences and expertise. He hopes to develop novel, patient-centred intervention strategies, for patients to overcome loss of social activity and participation arising from difficulties in their hearing.

Research Interest

Working within the Mild to Moderate Hearing Loss team at the NIHR funded Nottingham BRC, David's current research aims to find clinical strategies for overcoming loss of social activity and participation caused by difficulties in hearing. The team are evaluating novel technological and patient-centred interventions using randomised control trials, targeting those groups most affected. The overall goal of the team is to focus on enhancing patients' engagement and compliance with their treatment so that it will give them maximum benefit.