Rate My Professor Sharon Leitch

Dr Sharon Leitch is a Senior Lecturer and Head of the Department of Primary Health Care (Dunedin) at the University of Otago, part of the Faculty of Medicine in the Health Sciences Division. She possesses qualifications including MBChB, DCH, PGDipGP, PhD, and FRNZCGP, and works as a General Practitioner at Dunedin Health Centre. In her departmental roles, she has served as Research Convener and contributed to the Postgraduate Education Committee. Leitch provides media expertise on general practice and primary care matters.

Her research specializations encompass improving patient safety in primary care through informing patients of medication harm risks, enhancing patient self-efficacy, enabling shared decision-making with patients, whānau, and clinicians, and optimising routinely collected healthcare data for research. She established and leads the Southern Primary Care Research Network (SPCRN), conducting studies such as Delphi exercises and qualitative investigations to define primary care research priorities in Southern Aotearoa New Zealand. Key publications include 'The Southern Primary Care Research Network 3 years on: Reflections from the end of the beginning' (Journal of Primary Health Care, 2025, co-authored with Pigden, Ryde, Atmore, Li, Moerenhout, Yeo, Williams, Smith, Turner, and Stokes), 'A qualitative study on the primary care research priorities of people in Southern Aotearoa New Zealand' (Journal of Primary Health Care, 2025, with Williams, Edmonds, Li, Nixon, and Stokes), 'Avoiding anti-inflammatories: a randomised controlled trial investigating an information package to reduce acute kidney injury risk' (BMJ Open, 2024), 'Establishing the research priorities of a national primary care research network in New Zealand: a Delphi exercise' (2024, with Li and Stokes), 'Epidemiology of healthcare harm in New Zealand general practice: A retrospective records review study' (BMJ Open, 2021), and 'Medication-related harm in New Zealand general practice: A retrospective records review' (British Journal of General Practice, 2021). These contributions illuminate medication harm prevalence and advance practice-based research infrastructure in New Zealand primary care.