PhD candidate Emma Persad re-elected member of the Cochrane Governing Board
As a member of the Cochrane Governing Board, Emma Persad represents Sweden and the Nordics, advocating for open science, international collaboration, and access to reliable research. Through her work, she aims to make healthcare more evidence-based and improve outcomes for the most vulnerable populations.
Emma’s journey into Cochrane began during her medical studies in Austria, where she worked as a researcher at Cochrane Austria. Her contributions earned her recognition as one of Cochrane’s “Top 30 under 30”, where she was elected to the Board for her first term from 2021–2024. She has now been re-elected for another term.
Emma is a PhD candidate conducting research in neonatal care and global health. Alongside her work at Karolinska Institutet (KI), she leads the new Cochrane Maternal, Newborn, and Child Health Thematic Group. This initiative focuses on strengthening the production of systematic reviews and promoting evidence-based care worldwide. The group collaborates with Cochrane Sweden in Lund to enhance Sweden's role in systematic reviews and methodological development.
Focusing on maternal, newborn, and child health, Emma’s work aims to reduce morbidity and mortality on a global scale. Her research centers on blood pressure physiology in extremely preterm infants (born before 28 weeks of gestation). Sweden's unique access to real-time data for these infants enables analyses that link newborns' health status to short- and long-term outcomes. The goal is to improve care during the critical first week of life.
In addition, she is part of an international clinical trial investigating probiotics for preterm infants in Sweden, Denmark, and Germany. This study has the potential to revolutionize neonatal care by enhancing health outcomes for these vulnerable groups.
With her groundbreaking research and international leadership, Emma Persad exemplifies how science and global collaboration can transform care for the most at-risk populations.