Harj has worked within various disciplines across the voluntary, statutory and private sector to develop practice with vulnerable clients including domestic violence, older adults, housing, challenging behaviour, and mental health. Her research area lies within the inter-section of domestic abuse and mental health of Sikh victims/ survivors.

She has had various clinical specialties within the NHS namely forensic mental health/learning difficulties, acute care, psychiatric liaison, addictions and crisis mental health teams, primary care CBT.

Her commitment to equality work has been lifelong initially rooted in community development work for a Race Equality Council. In later years she achieved a Keele Excellence Award for her role as BAME Staff Network Lead/ School Equalities Lead in 2018.

She has participated in Athena Swan and Race Equality Charter processes during this time. She has been involved in the European Recognition and Education in Violence, Abuse and Neglect for Medical and Healthcare Practitioners (REVAMP) project. She was actively involved in equality forums at Staffordshire University to promote the Race Equality Charter and further the Decolonisation agenda.

Harj has appeared on South Asian media programmes talking about mental health and impact on South Asian families. She has made international links to fund raise in India during Covid and built good relationships abroad.

• PhD-  University of Birmingham
• MSc in Advancing Practice- Bham University
• PGCHP- Stafford University
• Postgraduate CBT course – University of Coventry
• Creating Excellence Leadership Programme- University of Coventry
• Graduate Diploma in Mental Health Nursing with Distinction- University of Central England (BCU)
• BA (Hons) Psychology and Sociology- University of Wolverhampton

Projects

• Co-Investigator-  Gender Based Violence and Resilience in India
• REVAMP- European DVA Project
• Domestic Violence and Abuse in the South Asian/ Sikh Community
• Race Equality Research
• NGO’s in India

Aujla, H (2009) Helping women break through the glass ceiling: Harjinder Aujla asks if female nurses are given sufficient opportunities to undertake post-registration education and training programmes. Nursing Management. 2009 Mar 1;15(10):12-3.

Kaur- Aujla, H, Shain, F and Dr Lilley, A. (2019). A Gap Exposed: What is Known About Sikh victims of Domestic Violence Abuse (DVA) and their mental health? European Journal of Mental Health, 14(1), 179 -189.

Kaur-Aujla, H., Dunkley, N., & Ewens, A. (2021). Embedding race equality into nursing programmes: Hearing the student voice. Nurse Education Today, 102, 104932. doi:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.nedt.2021.104932

Kaur-Aujla, H and Wagstaff, C. (2021) Embracing Afghanistan’s refugees into the UK’s health and social care system. BMJ: Global Health Blog.

Pre-Publication

Adaene Alves Machado de Moura, Harjinder Kaur-Aujla, Angelica Martins de Souza Gonçalves et al. Alcohol Consumption by Women in the Previous Year Who Were Unaware They Were Pregnant, 27 September 2021, PREPRINT (Version 1) available at Research Square [https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-905679/v1]

Pending review/ publication

Kaur- Aujla, H and Dr. Lillie, K (2021) Prognosticating Covid- 19 Therapeutic Responses: A Bottomless Pit of Ambiguous Loss and Disenfranchised Grief." has been successfully submitted online and is presently being given full consideration for publication in Frontiers in Public Health.