Study Day 2026

Biography-Hon Prof. Ian Horsley PhD, MCSP, MMACP, CSCS

Ian has been a physiotherapist for over 34 years. He worked as a physiotherapist for England Rugby Union, for 14 years, with various teams, and spent the last 9 years working with the Elite Playing squad, as physiotherapist to England ‘A’ teams.

Currently Ian is Athlete Health Lead (Upper Limb) for the UK Sports Institute, Clinical Director of Back in Action Rehabilitation, in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, associate lecturer at Salford University, and member of the EdCom for EUSSER and BESS, along with the many one- and two-day courses he teaches across Europe.

He concluded his PhD in 2103 examining the issues around shoulder injuries in professional rugby and has published several articles in peer reviewed journals on the subject of musculoskeletal injury management and contributed chapters to several books on sports injury management.

He worked as part of the HQ medical team for Team England at the 2010 and 2014 Commonwealth Games, was a member of the Team GB HQ medical team at the 2012, 2016 and 2020/21 and 2024 Olympic Games and currently is a Consultant Physiotherapist to England Football.

In his spare time, Ian spends most of his time trying to learn to play golf, cycling, supporting Barnsley FC and having some quality time with his wife now the children have grown.

Mike Henning is an Advanced Practitioner Physiotherapist at Royal Devon NHS and an NIHR Pre doctoral Clinical and Practitioner Academic Fellow at UWE Bristol. His research focuses on how psychosocial factors are identified and used in musculoskeletal physiotherapy practice. His publications include a scoping review on physiotherapists’ ability to identify psychosocial factors in musculoskeletal pain and a recent UK wide survey on psychosocial assessment practice, alongside other published work in musculoskeletal service evaluation and quality improvement.

Chris Mercer is a consultant musculoskeletal physiotherapist and Clinical Director for Sussex MSK health, a community MSK service on the South Coast of England, leading a team of 470 clinicians working across MSK physiotherapy, occupational therapy, podiatry, osteopathy, pain and rheumatology. He is currently co-chair of the National Physiotherapy Consultant professional network in the UK, and co-chair of the UK Musculoskeletal Partnership group of over 40 organisations with an interest in MSK health. Chris was national clinical lead for the NHS England Best MSK health primary and community programme, helping to develop national clinical pathways and policy relating to MSK health.

He has contributed to multiple national documents and guidelines relating to MSK care and advanced practice roles in MSK. He has a keen interest in serious spinal pathology and teaches widely on the topic for the Musculoskeletal Association of Chartered Physiotherapists (MACP) and on several post graduate university courses. He has supervised over 50 post-graduate MACP clinical practice placements. He has published several peer reviewed papers relating to serious spinal pathology and professional practice.

He is a keen, if not very talented kickboxer and surfer, and an even less talented guitarist.

PhD (Primary Care), MSc (Global Public Health and Policy), MSc (Pain), BSc (Hons) Physiotherapy

Jackie is a clinical academic physiotherapist at University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. Jackie works with multidisciplinary teams and is involved in the management of complex pain in an integrated system across specialities as well as primary, community, secondary and tertiary care. Focussing on broadly critical perspectives and applied qualitative methodologies, she is building a research programme exploring different models of pain care, ethics, health inequities and epistemic practices. 

Jackie is currently a knowledge mobilisation fellow funded by the NIHR North Thames ARC where her work involves developing, implementing, and evaluating strategies to embed evidence for chronic pain into multi-professional practice using participatory approaches. She hopes this will inform a practical case study of moving evidence into practice.

Dr Tim Noblet is a Consultant Physiotherapist at St George’s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, London, specialising in musculoskeletal and spinal pain. He combines senior clinical leadership with an active clinical academic portfolio.

He leads advanced practice services across primary to tertiary care and holds multiple honorary and adjunct academic appointments internationally. His research programme centres on precision rehabilitation, psychologically informed practice, and workforce development, including UK leadership of the COMPASS (Comprehensive 360° Assessment of Spinal Pain) programme within the SPINA registry. He has secured competitive funding from NIHR, CSP, and charitable sources and is actively developing predictive models and personalised care pathways.

Over the past five years, Dr Noblet has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals on advanced practice, pain care, and outcome measurement, and is a regular invited speaker at national and international conferences. He plays a key role in shaping advanced practice standards and credentialing frameworks in the UK and contributes to global workforce development initiatives in physiotherapy.