His work is oriented to the salience of mental and neurological disorders to health and social policy in low and middle income countries (LMIC), with a focus on ageing, dementia and other chronic disease. He has coordinated, since 1998 the 10/66 Dementia Research Group, a network of researchers, mainly from LMIC working together to promote more good research into dementia in those regions. The group has published 140 papers covering dementia prevalence, incidence, aetiology and impact and contributed to knowledge of public health aspects of ageing and chronic disease in LMIC.