Sorry, I've realised that sounded a bit negative. What I'm trying to say is there might be alternative ways of meeting your goal without the necessity of doing another doctorate. It really depends on what your long term goals are.

I'm not sure about the funding issue but I would recommend talking to a careers advisor. Why do you think that doing an EngD would be a better way of kick-starting your career than getting a job or, if you need to transition to another field, doing a masters?

I wouldn't do this without doing a lot of homework about the possible limitations - ultimately it might harm your career prospects.

Yes, I would ignore that correction too. Don't forget that academic English has its own rhythms that deviate from some of the preferred rules in 'nicer' forms of written English. I wouldn't get too hung up on things like that.

I did biomedical sciences originally, but now work in clinical outcomes research. I did my Masters at LSHTM where there was about a 50:50 split of clinical to non clinical people on the course, which made for a really nice mixture of areas of interest and experience. If I had to choose again I would still go there because it was a fantastic experience, but overall it was a little more geared up towards communicable disease at the time (the course structure has since been through a bit of revision). The course at Imperial might have been better suited to the kind of things I've since gone on to do, but I don't regret my choice.

If you're interested in genetic epi, Sheffield actually do a specialist masters in that. Or at least they used to, but I'm struggling to find details, so maybe it's been discontinued.

If you want to work outside the UK, particularly in an LEDC settings, choose LSHTM. Ditto if you're into tropical diseases. The expertise and professional networks you would have access to there are probably unrivalled.

If you want to work in developed countries and/or are more interested in chronic diseases, it's a closer call. None of them would be a bad choice. If you have a specific areas that you want to get into subsequently, maybe check out whether there are any groups working on that at each uni.

I'm afraid I know very little about the course at Cambridge and whether it has anything to offer beyond what Imperial and LSHTM do (I've never met anyone who's studied it at Cambridge). From what I know, the research interests there seem to be mainly primary care research and genetic epidemiology, so if that's your thing then it might be a good place to go.

Yes, hence replying. But it would help to know what you actually want to find out. Are you trying to choose between one of the above courses? If so, selection of the 'best' course for you depends upon what you want to do afterwards and what your interests are.

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True, although by the looks of it Cambridge only submitted 10 people to the RAE and LSHTM submitted 135. When you study epi you'll learn how small sample sizes can skew results ;-)

All three are excellent institutions overall. So really if you're trying to choose between them it comes down to the questions I suggested before about what you want out of the masters?

In the UK, LSHTM is probably considered the most 'prestigious' for this subject. But which course is best for you depends on your interests and plans (e.g. research vs intervention work, communicable/non-communicable disease, which kind of country/setting you're interested in.)

Congratulations on finding a first supervisor. :)

To be honest you should probably discuss this issue with him/her in the first instance. It's not usually the case that students go and seek out second supervisors without their first supervisor knowing/contributing to the process. It's also usually the case that second supervisors are either at the same university, or have some pre-existing link with the research group/project.

If you're concerned about a second supervisor not being sympathetic to your needs, then I would suggest getting guidance from the student support services at your university, as they should have guidelines for how students with additional needs should be supported by their supervisors. But to be honest as long as your first supervisor is on board with things, then the second supervisor is less of an issue.

Good luck.

Anyhoo, I'd like to apologise for derailing a support thread. That wasn't really my intention. I just wanted to highlight that some formal measures that universities take to apparently address a problem can be detrimental in other ways that might not at first seem obvious. Overall, I think pigeon-holing people is a bad idea.

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Ach, some folks don't know when they're well off. I've been stuck on three for ages.

*sigh*

IoE might have some data if you contact them: http://www.ioe.ac.uk/

I doubt you'll find these numbers in the public domain.

lindalou is right. Another thing you might like to do is check the job market and see which of these projects is likely to give you skills that are in demand. Also, develop an awareness of where things are going in your field, as you need to be readying yourself for applying for the jobs that will exist in 3-4 years time.