Student
2022
MSc Applied Digital Health
Lincoln College
Oppenheimer-Skye Scholarship
South Africa

Ashley Murray

Ashley is a research clinician and medical doctor who has worked in the Perinatal HIV Research Unit at Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital in Soweto, South Africa. Her work has involved clinical trial research on the phase III study determining the efficacy of Jannsen's investigational COVID-19 vaccine candidate (Ad26.COV2.S). As an investigator and medical doctor, Ashley provided clinical oversight of study participants for the HIV Vaccine Trials Network (HVTN) and the AIDS Clinical Trials Group (ACTG) at the Soweto-Bara site and was also involved in pharmaceutical studies sponsored by the Kirby Institute, Merck Sharp & Dohme and Janssen. Ashley has participated in a total of 11 trials to date, with subsequent research expertise in the prevention and treatment of COVID-19, HIV and multidrug-resistant tuberculosis. Prior, Ashley served in the South African public healthcare system and military health service.

Ashley earned a Bachelor of Medicine & Surgery (MBBCh) with distinction at the University of the Witwatersrand in 2016. She was awarded the Dennis Goldstein Memorial Prize in Family Medicine and the Smith and Nephew Prize in Orthopaedic Surgery. Ashley is a dual recipient of the Skye Foundation Scholarship. Ashley will be studying the MSc in Applied Digital Health at the University of Oxford. Through the MSc, Ashley hopes to develop insight into user-centred digital health interventions. She intends to continue research within the scope of digital health to better inform academics, policymakers and physicians while remaining a clinician capable of collaborating with global health organisations in need of digital health expertise.