Sara Shaw has a background in medical sociology and policy analysis. Before joining the Nuffield Trust, she was based in the research department of Primary Care and Population Health at University College London, where she was supported by an Interdisciplinary Postdoctoral Fellowship, jointly funded by the Medical Research and Economic and Social Research Councils. 

She has undertaken wide-ranging research in areas such as the development of health research policy, the organisation of public health and primary care and European research policy, and has extensive experience of applying critical and qualitative approaches to studying health policy.

Sara has been active within a number of policy and research-oriented groups aligned with, for instance, the Department of Health, Royal College of General Practitioners and NHS R&D Forum. She is Associate Editor for BMC Health Services Research; co-editor of a series of nine research workbooks (two of which have won prizes in the annual BMA Book Competition); and has published widely on topics including shaping national health research policy, critical approaches to policy analysis and the organisation of primary care.

In addition to her role at the Nuffield Trust, Sara is also Honorary Associate Professor at Warwick Medical School and Honorary Senior Research Fellow at University College London.