Professor Yvonne Wren

Yvonne Wren is Chief Investigator of The Cleft Collective Cohort Study. She took over this role from Professor Jonathan Sandy on his retirement in 2020.

Yvonne qualified as a speech and language therapist at the University of Manchester and then worked in a clinical capacity in Liverpool and Bristol for ten years before beginning a research career. She obtained her PhD in 2005 from the University of Bristol and was awarded a fellowship from the National Institute of Health Research in 2011. 

Alongside her role at the University of Bristol, Yvonne is also Professor of Speech and Language Therapy at Cardiff Metropolitan University and Director of Bristol Speech and Language Therapy Research Unit at North Bristol NHS Trust. 

Yvonne was Chair of the Child Speech Committee for the International Association of Communication Sciences and Disorders (IALP) and was also a member of the board for this global organisation from 2016 to 2022. She founded the UK and Ireland Child Speech Disorder Research Network which serves to advance research with children with speech sound disorder. 

She has served on numerous funding panels and research councils as Chair and member. The impact of her work includes the two sets of guidelines for the transcription and analysis of children’s speech with the Child Speech Disorder Research Network and the identification of risk factors for persistent speech disorders, which has contributed to the All Wales Speech Pathway and clinical guidance provided by the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (RCSLT). 

Yvonne received a Giving Voice award from the RCSLT in 2022, Certificate of Appreciation from the International Association of Communication Sciences and Disorders in 2021, Patient Involvement and Engagement in Research (PIER) Award from the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (with colleagues in the Cleft Collective) in 2020, and the Editor’s award for the Journal of Speech, Language and Hearing Research (with Sound Start Study colleagues) in 2017. She was elected Fellow of the RCSLT in 2022.