Our Speakers

Vijay Acharya 
Breakfast Briefing Speaker

 Vijiay is the highly reliable and respected business owenr of Charles Rippin & Turner established since 2948. Vijay's extensive experience in running a successful accounts firm offers not only accountancy services, but also offers consultancy and business advice services to clients across the medical sector; specialising in financial, business and tax services for GP surgeries, locum doctors, dentists and pharmacists.

Tazeen Ahmed
Conference Chair

Tazeen Ahmad is a Bafta-nominated TV reporter, presenter and writer. She has worked at a senior level across all the major broadcasters for over 20 years including ITN, NBC, BBC and Channel 4. An award-winning investigative reporter for 'Dispatches' on Channel 4, a former foreign-correspondent for NBC News and a regular contributor to national newspapers and magazines, she is also the author of 'The Check-out Girl', published by Harper Collins which details her working undercover in a supermarket during the height of the recession. 

Michelle Drage
Londonwide LMC's Keynote Speaker

Dr Michelle Drage MB BS FRCGP Dip Med Ac has been Chief Executive of Londonwide LMCs since 2002 (a post shared jointly with Dr Tony Stanton prior to his retirement in 2010). Previously, Michelle was LMC Secretary of the Middlesex LMCs since 1993. Before that she was a GP Principal in West London for some thirteen years. During that time she was a GP Trainer and also Postgraduate GP Tutor. Michelle has been an elected regional representative on the BMA’s General Practitioners Committee (GPC) since 1998 and was also a member of the negotiating team between 2004-2008. She was previously joint chair of the GPC/Royal College of General Practitioners’ Joint Workforce Subcommittee, chair of the Statutes & Regulations Subcommittee, a member of the Primary Care Development Subcommittee and a co-opted member of the Part 1 Subcommittee (PMS). 

Trevor Anders
GDPR and you: information governance in general practice

Trevor Anders is a programme manager at NHS Digital with substantial experience working in the health and care sector in both primary and secondary care implementing change programmes working with the Department of Health and Social care and NHS England. Most recently, he led on implementing the IT systems and information governance processes across NHS Digital to handle type 2 objections including the collection of the objections data from GP systems. Now Trevor is supporting the development and introduction of the National Data Opt-out that was recommended in the National Data Guardian’s “Review of data security, consent and opt-outs”. He led on raising awareness of the national data opt-out across health and care organisations in England and developing the materials needed to help health and care professionals and staff to understand the wider uses of patient data and the opt-out choice available to patients. 

Shanee Baker
GDPR and you: information governance on general practice

Shanee Baker established LMC Law in 2014. Having worked for the British Medical Association for nearly ten years as Senior Lawyer to the General Practitioners Committee she has an excellent and in depth knowledge of General Practice and all subsidiary matters relating to the day to day activities, issues, legislation affecting primary healthcare, provider arm networks, Clinical Commissioning Groups and the Local Medical Committees that support the profession. Previously, Shanee was Head of Legal at City and Guilds of London and senior lawyer at Capita PLC where she gained extensive experience in corporate/commercial law, mergers and acquisitions. 

Dr Naureen Bhatti
Retaining the future

Naureen is a GP in Tower Hamlets and the Health Education England (HEE) Head of School for General Practice for North Central and East London.  She has particular expertise in recruitment and retention and she was until 2016 Associate Dean for Inducting, Returning and Retaining the Workforce in the Professional Support Unit, London.  She is the HEE national lead for the new GP Retention Scheme and has been on the HEE Operational Group for the International GP Recruitment Programme. She is passionate about flexibility to ensure work-life balance for doctors as their needs change through their working lives, enabling their retention in the workforce. 

Tina Bishop
The community connection

Tina has a wide breath of knowledge and experience of Primary Health Care having worked in general practice and the community for over 25 years. Tina has also worked in higher education where she had responsibilities for planning and delivering professional educations to a wide range of health care professionals. She has held various posits in PCTs and NHS England. Tina is a past Chair of the RCN Practice Nurse Association. She is also the Editor-in-Chief of Practice Nurse Journal.  

Colin Brown
GDPR and you: information governance in general practice

Colin Brown is UK Director of Independent Living and Crisis response with responsibility for delivering high quality independent living and crisis response services across the four countries. This includes overseeing health and social care services supporting over 200,000 people in around 50% of the acute hospitals in the UK. He is responsible for taking a lead role in coordinating the collective Red Cross response during emergencies. Colin has been with the Red Cross for nearly seven years. He is currently a board member of Action Hampshire (rural community council) and until 2017 he was on the board of Healthwatch Hampshire and the NHS People and Communities’ Board. Prior to joining the British Red Cross Colin worked in senior roles for a variety of organisations including RNIB, Brighton New Deal for Communities and major regeneration programmes in South London.

Dr Stephanie De Giorgio
GP Resilience

Stephanie de Giorgio is a portfolio GP working in East Kent. She has been a GP partner, salaried GP and now works as a locum, both in GP surgeries and the ED. She is a member of GPC and runs Resilient GP, the biggest online Primary Care group with over ten thousand members which provides peer support and education to its members. Clinically her interests are women's health and perinatal mental health and she works with NB medical to run courses in these topics as well as working with the Perinatal Mental Health Partnership to increase awareness and knowledge about the subject amongst professionals and the public. 

Nick Downham
Quality improvement in general practice

Nick is a leading expert in improvement and best practice operations management in healthcare, social care and in industry. He has led and played central roles in national improvement and high profile professional development programmes. Nick is an improvement specialist, gaining his operational experience in industry and healthcare. He specialises in quality improvement, measurement, safety, and flow. Nick believes in the fundamental role amazing public services play in supporting people at their most vulnerable. He is currently supporting a wide range of organisations in their improvement journeys. These range from hospitals, universities, general practice, hospices and clinical commissioning groups. (www.cressbrookltd.co.uk)

Sir Sam Everington
Quality improvement in general practice

Sam has been a GP in Tower Hamlets since 1989, is chair of Tower Hamlet's CCG and clinical lead for the STP. He is part of the Bromley By Bow GP partnership, with over 100 projects under its roof supporting the wider determinants of health. He is governor of a local primary school and was one of the founders of THEDOC – Tower Hamlets GP Out of Hours Service. Sam is a qualified Barrister, a member of BMA Council and Vice President of the BMA. In 1999 he received an OBE for services to inner city primary care in 2006, The International Award of Excellence in Health Care and in 2015 a knighthood for services to primary care. He is a director of Community Health Partnerships (NHS Lift). He has previously been a member of GMC Council, Cabinet appointed Ambassador for Social Enterprise, Acting Chair of the BMA and national advisor to NHS England for the new models of care. 

Dr Clare Gerada
How to avoid burnout and promote self-compassion

Clare studied medicine at University College London, qualifying in 1982. She trained in medicine, then psychiatry and then followed her father’s footsteps and became a general practitioner in South London, where she has stayed ever since, just about to celebrate her 25th anniversary at the practice. Dr Gerada has held a number of national roles, including, Senior Policy Advisor Department of Health, Drugs and Alcohol. Director of RCGP Substance Misuse Use Unit & was Chair of RCGP National Expert Group on Substance Misuse. In both of these roles, Dr Gerada provided national leadership in substance misuse, developing the RCGP Certificate in Substance Misuse and supporting the creation of shared care working across England. Dr Gerada is the NHS Practitioner Health Programme and NHS GP Health Medical Director and established PHP. In 2008, she won the contract to run the Practitioner Health Programme (www.php.nhs.uk), which is a pioneering, award winning, free and confidential NHS service for doctors and dentists with issues relating to a mental or physical health concern or addiction problem, in particular where these might affect their work.

Sir Muir Gray
Population and personalisation - the 2P Paradigm; Expert Panel Member

Muir Gray is now working with both NHS England and Public Health England to bring about a transformation of care with the aim of increasing value for both populations and individuals and published a series of How To Handbooks for example, How to Get Better Value Healthcare, How To Build Healthcare Systems and How To Create the Right Healthcare Culture. His hobby is ageing and how to cope with it and he has published books for publish a book for people aged seventy called Sod 70! one for the younger decade called Sod60! This with Dr Claire Parker, and his book for people aged 40-60, titled Midlife, was published in 2017. 

Phillipa-Rose Hodgson
Digital enablers for patient care and practice management

Pip Hodgson works on delivering a number of digital initiatives out into the system including Online Consultations in General Practice, Mobilising NHS Online pilot apps which look to integrate primary care with urgent and emergency care as well as developing a digital maternity record for expectant mothers. Maternity apps and much more. Starting life off as a Nurse in ED, she understands first-hand the pressures the NHS is under and hope that engaging in more digital ways of working will help over time to reduce this. 

Dr Suzy Jordache
How to avoid burnout and promote self-compassion

Dr. Suzy Jordache is a senior full-time educator with the Medical Protection Society (MPS). Her role involves researching, delivering and training a large team of clinicians to offer risk reducing education to members around the world. Suzy also leads the MPS Clinical Communication Programme (CCP) in the UK, Ireland and South Africa. This work involves supportive coaching with doctors and dentists who have received a disproportionate number of claims and complaints against them. Prior to her post with MPS, Suzy has 20 years’ clinical experience as a General Practitioner, followed by time in psychiatry and then as Director of Psychological Medicine in a UK Hospice. Suzy’s most recent project at MPS has been to understand the impact of burnout on members and their medicolegal risk. 

Professor Rebecca Malby
Quality improvement in general practice

Becky is a professor in Health Systems Innovation at London South Bank University, where she leads the Health Systems Innovation Lab, providing change management support to systems change work; leadership programmes for emerging leaders, network leaders and citizen leaders; the London Primary Care Quality Academies; and catalysing spread through an international network. She has a track record in systems innovation, organisational change and leadership development in the UK and Internationally, and in leading networks. Her experience is an unusual combination of leader, manager, researcher, change agent and entrepreneur. She is known to be an energetic and enthusiastic leader of change and a forward thinker. 

Dr Aseem Malhotra
You can't drug people into being healthy; Expert Panel Member

Described as an inspiration by Jamie Oliver, internationally renowned Consultant Cardiologist and best selling author of The Pioppi Diet, Dr Aseem Malhotra has become one of the most influential and well-known health campaigners, and a pioneer of the lifestyle medicine movement in the UK. Dr Malhotra has been named alongside anti-obesity activists such as Michael Bloomberg and Michelle Obama has been featured in the New York Times on his documentary film "The Big Fat Fix" which premiered in British parliament. He is a spokesperson for the Academy of Medical Royal Colleges Obesity and Choosing Wisely Steering Groups and in 2015 became the youngest member to be appointed to the board of trustees of health think tank, The King's Fund. 

Professor Martin Marshall
Re-thinking medicine; Expert Panel Member

Martin Marshall is Professor of Healthcare Improvement at UCL, Programme Director for Primary Care at UCLPartners and leads Improvement Science London, an initiative to promote and embed the science of improvement across the health service and academic sectors. In November 2016 he was elected to Vice Chair (External Affairs) of the RCGP. Previously he was Director of R&D at the Health Foundation, Deputy Chief Medical Officer for England and Director General in the Department of Health, a clinical academic at the University of Manchester and a Harkness Fellow in Healthcare Policy. 

Jennie Morrison
The community connection

Jennie Morrison graduated from Kingston University in 2009 with a BSc HONS in Nursing Studies. On qualifying, she made the move straight into Primary Care and has never looked back. Jennie currently works as a Senior Practice nurse within Sutton CCG and has a specialist interest in managing Long Term Conditions. She has worked as a Locality Lead Nurse for the CCG and is now the CEPN/Preceptorship Lead Nurse. Jennie is passionate about encouraging nurses to choose General Practice as a career and is currently implementing the Preceptorship Programme throughout her local area, and working collaboratively with the other CCG's within South London.

Liz Nicholls
The community connection

Liz started her nurse training in 1975 as an Army nurse with the Queen Alexandra Royal Army Nursing Corp. She came into General Practice in 1991, and has undertaken many roles over the past 27 year, including Practice Nursing, Nurse practitioner, Lead Nurse, Professional Executive nurse and Nurse to the Board with Greenwich Primary Care Trust. Liz has a keen interest in education and training, and ensuring that the nursing voice is heard. She is currently Primary Care Tutor with Bexley Community Education Provider Network. 

Dr Elliott Singer
GP Resilience

Dr Singer has worked for Londonwide LMCs GP support team for the past 4 years and has been the Medical Director for the North East London sector for the past two years. He has been a GP principal for 15 years in a large partnership in Chingford East London. Dr Singer has previously held positions as the Medical Directors for the GPLHCC in Waltham Forest, a VTS programme director and an Associate Director for London Deanery.  

Dr Ruth Tinson
Patient engagement - lost in translation

Ruth joined the London Ambulance Service as an Assistant Medical Director in 2016 and work 2 days per week for the Service alongside her work as a GP and Vice-Chair of the Bromley LMC. She trained at St Bartholomew’s Hospital Medical School in London having previously qualified as a nurse at Charing Cross Hospital. She completed her GP training in Bristol in 2004, then returned to hospital medicine, completing Emergency Medicine training in South West London in 2010. She then returned to General Practice working in several practices, UCCs and out-of-hours services. As a nurse, Ruth worked in London and Australia, and as a doctor have worked in London, the East Midlands and the South West. She is driven by a passion for patient care and safety and is enthusiastic in developing innovative ways to provide and deliver first class healthcare to Londoners.

Amanda Waite
The community connection

Amanda has worked in primary care for most of her nursing career with a keen interest in respiratory and women’s health. Amanda particularly enjoys sharing her knowledge and experience with students have a prime purpose of raising quality standards and safety for patients. Amanda joined the Southampton CCG in 2017 to support practices in the city with a particular focus on nursing workforce, supporting their sustainability within the future changes of primary care. She continues to practice clinically supporting the LARC services in Wiltshire and she is a Specialist Nurse Advisor for the CQC.

Dr Vicky Weeks
Retaining the future

Initially having been a partner in General Practice, Vicky have worked as a Sessional GP in London for most of her professional GP career. She is a Medical Director for North Central London at Londonwide LMCs since 2013, and the GP representative for Hounslow on Ealing Hammersmith and Hounslow LMCs. Vicky is a member of the GPC Sessional GP Subcommittee since 1997, and was its Chair 2002-2016. She continues to maintain an active interest in workforce and am one of the national leads for the GP Retention scheme and for other workforce initiatives as part of the 10 point workforce plan, as well as addressing the challenges that the changing face of service delivery and the impact of new models of care, including contractual options and career development in the GP workforce. 

Kathryn Yates
The community connection

Director of primary care nursing and WTI