William Whiteley

William Whiteley is a Scottish Senior Clinical Fellow (funded by CSO) in the Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences, University of Edinburgh.

He is also Senior Clinical Fellow in the Nuffield Department of Population Health, University of Oxford; an International Fellow at the Population Health Research Institute, University of McMaster (Canada); and a consultant neurologist in NHS Lothian, working with patients with stroke and dementia. 

His work seeks to elucidate the mechanisms for prevention of disability due to stroke and dementia through the design, delivery and analysis of epidemiological studies and clinical trials. Of particular interest are: the contribution of vascular risk factors to dementia; the very long term follow-up of randomised trials; and the better use of large electronic health record datasets for more efficient clinical trials and cohort studies.

He has founded and run the Edinburgh Stroke Winter School. He has been supported by personal fellowships from the UK MRC (Clinician Scientist fellowship 2010-2015), the Chief Scientist’s Office (2006-2009, 2018-2025), and his work by the Alzheimer's Society, the Stroke Association and Chest, Heart and Stroke Scotland.

Current research interests:

• Contribution of known vascular risk factors to dementia
• Diagnosis and treatment of minor and transient neurological attacks
• Development of novel methods for large scale trials with electronic health records