Dr. Claire Magner
Dr. Claire Magner, one of seven children from a farm in West Limerick, was inspired by her mother’s nursing career. At 18, she moved to the UK to study general nursing at Middlesex University London, graduating in 1999.
She worked in adult intensive care nursing at Chase Farm Hospital in London, and after a period of travel returned to Ireland in 2001 to work in the intensive care unit at St. James’s Hospital, Dublin. After two years, she decided to train as a children’s nurse.
In 2003, Claire began the Higher Diploma in Children’s Nursing at University College Dublin, completing clinical placements at Crumlin Children’s Hospital and qualifying in 2005. She further specialised by completing a paediatric intensive care course at UCD, where she developed a strong interest in paediatric critical care and pain management.
Claire earned a master’s degree in clinical practice from the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland (RCSI) in 2009, focusing on pain in paediatric intensive care patients. While working as a Clinical Audit and Research Nurse, she developed skills in data analysis and benchmarking, which laid the foundation for her doctoral studies. She completed her PhD in clinical practice in paediatric intensive care nursing at RCSI in 2014, researching pain and sedation management in children after cardiac surgery.
In 2016, Claire joined UCD as a Lecturer in Children’s Nursing. She is a registered general and children’s nurse with extensive experience in adult, cardiac, and paediatric intensive care.
Today, Dr Claire Magner is an Assistant Professor and Lecturer in Children’s Nursing at the UCD School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Systems and Head of Subject for Children’s Nursing. Working as part of the Children’s Team, and the wider School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Systems brings her enormous professional and personal fulfilment.
See below.
Current Research Challenges
Dr Claire Magner has a specialist focus on the care of cardiac infants. Historically, infants from Northern Ireland with congenital heart conditions were transferred to specialist centres in the UK for treatment. To promote equity of access to specialist cardiac care, a political decision was later made to provide cardiac surgical care in Children’s Health Ireland in Crumlin for all children on the island of Ireland. To support this cross-border model, the All-Island Congenital Heart Disease Network (AICHDN) was established. In 2021, Dr Magner led the nursing education program for staff in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, enhancing care standards across the network.
Dr Magner is a co-investigator on a multi-site study investigating the impact of neonatal gut microbiota on outcomes after heart surgery, in collaboration with UCD, Children’s Health Ireland at Crumlin, the APC Microbiome Centre, and University College Cork. Her work focuses on examining the gut microbiome in cardiac infants, as their compromised heart function affects intestinal blood flow. Her research has shown that these infants have a profoundly altered gut microbiome compared to healthy controls. This can have implications on health outcomes, including psychological wellbeing.
During COVID-19, Dr Magner examined the impact of the pandemic on critical care staff in four Irish hospitals, including their coping mechanisms, and found an overall prevalence of 14% risk of PTSD, with certain groups more at risk of psychological distress, including nurses and redeployed staff. Further research led by Dr Magner examined the effects of the 2021 HSE conti-ransomware attack on critical care staff, and offered novel insights into the psychological impacts of cyberattacks on healthcare professionals.
This work led to a collaboration with the National Office for Suicide Prevention to develop a suicide prevention training program for undergraduate healthcare students. Delivered as a research pilot to over 160 medical, veterinary, nursing, and physiotherapy undergraduate students, the program uses a train-the-trainer model. Ideally this module would sit as an interdisciplinary offering in the undergraduate curriculum across the College of Health and Agricultural Sciences.The next stage will expand beyond academic settings to hospital and community organisations nationwide in collaboration with external partners.
The Researcher
Dr Magner has been involved for the past three years in DDS-MAP (Dynamic Digital Resilience for Medical and Allied Professions in Health Services), a European research project under the EU4Health Program. This initiative brings together 15 partners across Europe to develop training that enhances healthcare professionals’ digital skills, promotes reflective practice, and creates tailored educational modules based on an EU-wide assessment. Dr Magner contributes her expertise from leading graduate programs in children’s nursing, cardiac care, and paediatric intensive care. She also facilitates design thinking workshops to co-design training programs that incorporate user experience and public and patient involvement (PPI).
She is the Programme Director for Ireland’s only level-9 Graduate Diploma in Critical Care Nursing (Children’s), as well as the newly launched Graduate Diploma and Graduate Certificate in Children’s Cardiac Care. Developed in collaboration with stakeholders from both sides of the Irish border, these programs address the increasing needs of children with Congenital Heart Disease and their families. She also teaches on the BSc in Children’s and General Nursing, with a focus on critically ill children. Dr Magner is a member of the Research, Education, and Innovation Committee for the All Island Congenital Heart Disease Network and is a committee member on the European Society for Paediatric and Neonatal Intensive Care (ESPNIC), the Paediatric and Congenital Cardiac (PaCC) Nursing Midwifery and AHP Research Group, the Association for European Paediatric and Congenital Cardiology (AEPC) and the Irish Association of Critical Care Nurses (IACCN).
Outside of work, she enjoys swimming in the ocean, spending time with her young family, reading, tennis, going to the gym, and travelling.
Future Research Aspirations
Dr Magner’s upcoming research focus is on children and adults with congenital heart disease within the Irish healthcare context. Liaising with researchers in the UK, she aims to examine both the parallels and unique differences in Ireland compared to the UK. With a smaller population, Ireland faces distinct challenges, such as issues around anonymity, close interpersonal relationships, and having only one specialist treatment centre compared to multiple centres in the UK, which also creates travel demands for patients.
Mental health and well being in children and adults with congenital heart disease remains under researched, despite significant implications for life expectancy and the potential genetic factors involved. There is also a psychological impact related to feelings of guilt or responsibility, particularly concerning future pregnancies, which warrants further exploration. The all island population’s patterns of inward and outward migration add additional complexities that differentiate it from the UK.
Dr Magner is also interested in future collaborations at the intersection of children’s nursing and mental health nursing, aiming to develop courses that foster more holistic practitioners able to address the comprehensive needs of these patients.