Hong is currently a Research Fellow in Acute Care Interfaces, working as part of a new research team under Professor Dan Lasserson. The team seeks to understand/evaluate how to effect changes in processes of care that result in an acute care system that is resilient to surges in demand and can be delivered sustainably. Hong is an experienced health services researcher, with a background in public health and health protection. She has significant research experience and knowledge in the following cancer-related areas: early diagnosis, urgent and emergency care, and palliative/end-of-life care. She uses both qualitative and quantitative methods (including evidence synthesis methods), but her strength has been in researching sensitive or complex issues using qualitative methods. Hong's research interest has been to improve quality of life in people with cancer and comorbidities, drawing on resources from family, health and social care systems, and wider social and cultural environment. In recent years, she has also developed a keen interest in and started to explore and apply Systems Thinking methods in researching complex health (services) problems. Hong is currently co-leading an NIHR Policy Research Programme founded research on Hospital at Home service models (https://fundingawards.nihr.ac.uk/award/NIHR202691). She also supports the regional evaluation of Rapid Diagnostic Centres for cancer patients with vague symptoms in the West Midlands.

With a first-degree in Management, Hong worked in businesses and international NGOs (including Public Health NGO) in her home country of China, and other countries before coming to study in Europe. She was awarded Erasmus Mundus grant (full scholarship) by the European Commission to undertake her Masters Studies in European Public Health at Jagiellonian University and University of Sheffield between 2006 and 2008. In 2012, she completed her PhD study looking at palliative/End-of-life care services development in China, funded by the Open University. Since then she has undertaken or been involved in many cancer-related, applied health services research in her previous jobs at the University of Liverpool and the University of Hull.