Claire Dosdale is a Senior Lecturer in Adult Nursing and nurse academic at Northumbria University, specialising in violence against women and girls (VAWG), trauma-informed care, and healthcare education. Her work bridges research, education, and practice to enhance healthcare responses to gender-based violence and improve nursing student preparation for addressing violence in clinical settings.

In her academic role, Claire oversees student professional standards through her leadership responsibilities as Fitness to Practise school lead, and as programme lead for adult field co-horts. She teaches across undergraduate and postgraduate nursing programs, with a focus on safeguarding, professional practice, and evidence-based care.

Claire's research expertise centres on disclosure experiences in healthcare settings, exploring how survivors of sexual violence navigate help-seeking and the factors that facilitate or hinder disclosure to healthcare professionals. Her PhD research contributes to understanding trauma-informed approaches and organisational responses to sexual violence. She actively engages in Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) methodologies, working collaboratively with survivor communities to ensure research meaningfully addresses their needs and experiences.

Claire's scholarship encompasses violence prevention, Active Bystander Training, and she is currently working on an international scale adaptation relating to gendered violence myth assumptions. She has contributed to national and international discourse on gendered violence in healthcare through publications in peer-reviewed journals, conference presentations, and media engagement including exploring 'Gendered Violence and Abuse: how nurses can help patients and peers' in the British Journal of Nursing podcast.

She is committed to interdisciplinary collaboration, working across health, social care, policing, and third sector organisations to develop evidence-based interventions and educational approaches that create safer healthcare environments for both patients and staff.

Claire sits on Rape Crisis Tyneside and Northumberland Board of Trustees and is also a Board Member at Large for Nursing Network on Violence Against Women International.

My research interests centre on healthcare responses to sexual violence and gender-based violence, with particular focus on trauma-informed care implementation and survivor-centred practice. I explore the public health implications of interpersonal violence and trauma, including long-term health consequences and population-level impacts of interventions.

My work examines attitudinal barriers to disclosure and support, including victim-blaming perspectives and rape myth acceptance among healthcare professionals and the general public. I am committed to employing rigorous yet ethical research methodologies, including descriptive phenomenology and participatory approaches, to conduct sensitive research that prioritises survivor voices and experiences

Research Interests:

Violence and Trauma

• Healthcare responses to sexual violence and gender-based violence
• Trauma-informed care implementation in clinical settings
• Public health implications of interpersonal violence and trauma

Social Attitudes and Barriers

• Victim-blaming attitudes and rape myth acceptance
• Attitudinal barriers to disclosure and help-seeking
• Sexual harassment in healthcare and professional contexts
• Active bystander Training

Research Methodologies

• Descriptive phenomenological approaches
• Ethical conduct of sensitive research with vulnerable populations
• Participatory and survivor-centred research methods

Wider Nursing Interests:

• Fitness to practise 
• Ethical use of AI in nurse education relating
• Women in leadership within health organisations