Team Member

Dr Sophia Varadkar

Medical Director

Dr Sophia Varadkar is a Consultant Paediatric Neurologist and Deputy Medical Director at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust.

Sophia completed her undergraduate degree at Trinity College Dublin, Ireland and her postgraduate medical training in Dublin and London. Her clinical work focuses on complex epilepsy, the Children’s Epilepsy Surgery Service, Vagus Nerve Stimulation Therapy (VNS) and Laser Interstitial Thermal Therapy (LiTT). Genomics has become integral across her clinical work, and she has close working collaborations with clinical genetics.

Her clinical research training and PhD were laboratory-based in GOSH UCL Institute of Child Health.  Since then, she has been site principle investigator and co-investigator on a number of clinical studies and is co-applicant on an NIHR Programme Grant: Transforming the mental health treatment of young people with epilepsy.

She has held senior clinical leadership roles at GOSH, in North Central London, North Thames and nationally. Currently Sophia sits on the NHS England Paediatric Neuroscience Clinical Reference Group, is Chair of the Steering Committee for the British Paediatric Neurology Association Paediatric Epilepsy Training Programme and is a Board member for the North Thames Paediatric Network.  Previously she has been a Council Member of the International League Against Epilepsy British Branch, member of the RCPCH Epilepsy Programme Board and member of the NCL Ethics Advisory Committee.  Sophia was honoured to be named the Women’s Network GOSH Inspirational Woman of the Year 2023.

Originally from Dublin, she lives in London since 1998 with her husband and two teenage children. Sophia loves cooking (and eating), almost all kinds of rock music and Sci Fi-fantasy. She is a school governor for a local primary school.