
Dr Ioannis Bakolis
Senior Lecturer in Biostatistics and Epidemiology
Research interests
- Mental Health
Biography
Ioannis Bakolis is senior lecturer in Biostatistics and Epidemiology at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience. Before joining King’s College, Ioannis have previously held research positions at Imperial College London (2013-2015) and (2008-2012) and London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (2012-2013). During that time, Ioannis completed a PhD in Biostatistics and Epidemiology at Imperial College London (2013) under the supervision of Prof. Peter Burney and Prof. Richard Hooper.
Research Interests
Dr Ioannis Bakolis is interested in how social, built and physical environments affect the epidemiology of both physical and mental health. Some examples of Ioannis current work include exploring how exposure to road-traffic air and noise pollution affect mental disorders; and how neighbourhood deprivation relate to mental health over the life course. Ioannis is also a member of the core team of the Urban Mind project involving the development and use of smartphone technologies to monitor the impact of the surrounding physical and social environment on population mental health in real time. Although not exclusively, much of Ioannis work is conducted within large population-based surveys; birth cohorts and routinely collected information stemming from smartphone technologies and electronic health records.
Ioannis research interests also extend to the use of quasi-experimental methods and data from hybrid trials on the evaluation and implementation of population health interventions and nationwide policies. Ioannis is a co-I and lead statistician of INDIGO and EMILIA, two recently MRC-funded projects which aim to tackle stigma and discrimination in 6 LMIC countries; TIDES, a study funded by the Wellcome Trust for developing an intervention framework to address the role of discrimination by healthcare practitioners in generating and perpetuating health inequalities.
Ioannis is also interested in issues of causal inference and statistical methods for intensive longitudinal data as they relate to his work.
- Urban environment and mental health
- Social and environment stressors and mental health over the life course
- Natural experiments
- Hybrid trials
Teaching
- Co-Module leader: ‘Advanced Statistical Methods in Psychiatric Epidemiology’, Global Mental Health Msc
- Module leader: “Intro to Statistical Modelling”, Applied Statistics and Statistical Modelling Msc
Current course lectures
- ‘Quasi-experimental designs’, Applied Statistics and Statistical Modelling Msc
- Urban environment and mental health, Urban Informatics Msc
- ‘Evaluation of scale-up of complex population health interventions’, Global Mental Health Msc
- I currently supervise 3-4 MSc students per year for their final dissertations, and 4 full time PhD students. I am willing to accept new PhD students. Interested students should contact me with an idea of their project proposal in the first instance, with an indication of any potential funding support.
Expertise and Public Engagement
As expert commentator for the Science Media Centre Ioannis regularly provides comments on air pollution stories in relation to mental health in the popular media.
Research

Centre for Implementation Science
The Centre for Implementation Science is home to a team of expert implementation and improvement science researchers, including health economists and statisticians. This team are investigating how best to help ‘implement’ evidence-based practice and clinical research within health services nationally and internationally.

Tackling Inequalities and Discrimination Experiences in health Services (TIDES)
TIDES study investigates how discrimination experienced by both patients and healthcare practitioners may generate and perpetuate inequalities in health service
Project status: Ongoing

Health Inequalities Research Group
Health Inequalities Research Group is focused on discrimination and other forms of social adversity; community mental health; inequalities in mental health and health services.

SHAPER - Scaling-up Health Arts Programmes: Implementation and Effectiveness Research
SHAPER is a programme that will assess the effectiveness and implementation of 3 arts-in-health, Melodies for Mums with Postnatal Depression, Dance for Parkinson’s, Stroke Odysseys.
News
Exposure to air pollution is associated with increased use of psychiatric services in people with dementia
New research from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at king's College London has found exposure to air pollution is associated...

Healthcare workers in England experience PTSD at twice the rate of the general public
New research led by the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King’s College London in collaboration with the NIHR ARC North Thames at...

Adults living in areas with high air pollution are more likely to have multiple long-term health conditions
Exposure to traffic related air pollution is associated with an increased likelihood of having multiple long-term physical and mental health conditions,...

Excess deaths in people with mental health conditions increased during the COVID-19 pandemic
A study based on more than 160,000 patients has revealed greater number of deaths amongst those with mental health conditions and intellectual disabilities...

Exposure to air pollution linked with increased mental health service-use, new study finds
Exposure to traffic-related air pollution is associated with increased mental health service-use among people recently diagnosed with psychotic and mood...

Shifts to remote mental health services continued after lockdown, according to new study
The introduction and lifting of COVID-19 ‘lockdown’ policy in Spring 2020 was associated with significant changes in mortality and service delivery across...

Posts to Reddit forum “SuicideWatch” spike in the early hours of Monday morning
New research from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King’s College London has found that people on a social media suicide...

Events

Our planet, our people: understanding the health impacts of climate change
In this session, we brought together a panel of world-renowned experts to put in focus the physical and mental health impacts of climate change.
Please note: this event has passed.
Research

Centre for Implementation Science
The Centre for Implementation Science is home to a team of expert implementation and improvement science researchers, including health economists and statisticians. This team are investigating how best to help ‘implement’ evidence-based practice and clinical research within health services nationally and internationally.

Tackling Inequalities and Discrimination Experiences in health Services (TIDES)
TIDES study investigates how discrimination experienced by both patients and healthcare practitioners may generate and perpetuate inequalities in health service
Project status: Ongoing

Health Inequalities Research Group
Health Inequalities Research Group is focused on discrimination and other forms of social adversity; community mental health; inequalities in mental health and health services.

SHAPER - Scaling-up Health Arts Programmes: Implementation and Effectiveness Research
SHAPER is a programme that will assess the effectiveness and implementation of 3 arts-in-health, Melodies for Mums with Postnatal Depression, Dance for Parkinson’s, Stroke Odysseys.
News
Exposure to air pollution is associated with increased use of psychiatric services in people with dementia
New research from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at king's College London has found exposure to air pollution is associated...

Healthcare workers in England experience PTSD at twice the rate of the general public
New research led by the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King’s College London in collaboration with the NIHR ARC North Thames at...

Adults living in areas with high air pollution are more likely to have multiple long-term health conditions
Exposure to traffic related air pollution is associated with an increased likelihood of having multiple long-term physical and mental health conditions,...

Excess deaths in people with mental health conditions increased during the COVID-19 pandemic
A study based on more than 160,000 patients has revealed greater number of deaths amongst those with mental health conditions and intellectual disabilities...

Exposure to air pollution linked with increased mental health service-use, new study finds
Exposure to traffic-related air pollution is associated with increased mental health service-use among people recently diagnosed with psychotic and mood...

Shifts to remote mental health services continued after lockdown, according to new study
The introduction and lifting of COVID-19 ‘lockdown’ policy in Spring 2020 was associated with significant changes in mortality and service delivery across...

Posts to Reddit forum “SuicideWatch” spike in the early hours of Monday morning
New research from the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (IoPPN) at King’s College London has found that people on a social media suicide...

Events

Our planet, our people: understanding the health impacts of climate change
In this session, we brought together a panel of world-renowned experts to put in focus the physical and mental health impacts of climate change.
Please note: this event has passed.