Med X Panel

Dr Sinead Clarke, GP in Nantwich; Clinical Director, South Cheshire and Vale Royal CCGs; Medical Lead, Cheshire End of Life Partnership and GP Advisor, Macmillan Cancer Support.

Sinead has had a career long interest and passion for palliative care and through working in a hospice and becoming an end of life facilitator became involved in helping develop the Cheshire EPaCCS project. Through this work she has realised the huge potential benefits to patient care of information technology and has recently been involved in working with Mid-Cheshire NHS Foundation Trust on Virtual Hospital pathways which will allow patients to be diagnosed and managed more quickly and remove unnecessary appointments and visits to hospital.

Iain Hennessey, Consultant Paediatric and Neonatal Surgeon and Clinical Director at Alder Hey Innovation Hub.

Iain Hennessey is a consultant paediatric surgeon and director of innovation at the new Alder Hey Children’s Health Park. He graduated from the University of Edinburgh with honours degrees in Medicine, Surgery and Anatomical sciences, before going on to train as a paediatric surgeon in the United Kingdom and Australia. He has always been interested in innovation, helping found a startup surgical simulation company as a trainee and then progressing to become the clinical director of innovation at Alder Hey Children’s Hospital. Notable achievements have included forming partnerships with large multi national companies such as Sony and IBM, building a unique underground 1000sqm innovation facility for collaboration with the tech sector and developing a team of clinician entrepreneurs to drive change within the NHS. All of this was recognised nationally with the prestigious Health Service Journal Improving care with technology award.

He is currently developing a long term strategy to build the worlds first “Living hospital” by adapting emerging technologies to enable the building to care for the children within it, both medically and holistically. This work has encompassed artificial intelligence, advanced sensors, virtual reality and other consumer entertainment technologies.

Laura Jenions, Critical Care Physiotherapist at The Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.

Laura graduated with a BSc in Physiotherapy from Manchester University in 1999. A quick trip along the M62 led to a working life at the Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University Hospitals NHS Trust. A static post in critical care led to a MSc in Critical Care from Cardiff University in 2009. A passion for early rehabilitation and innovative therapies within critical care have followed, with an interest in the use of virtual reality in critical care, to encourage therapy and to help anxiety.

Dr Cecil Kullu, Consultant Psychiatrist and Associate Medical Director for Research, Development and Innovation, Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust.

Dr Cecil Kullu is a Consultant Psychiatrist in liaison Psychiatry based at Royal Liverpool University Hospital, Associate Medical Director for Research, Development and Innovation for Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust and Chair of the Cheshire and Merseyside clinical senate (NHS England). He has over 12 years of experience as a consultant psychiatrist working in a range of clinical mental health settings. His research and clinical interests are in the area of interaction between physical illness and mental health conditions, self harm, alcohol related brain damage and delusional infestation, application and development of technology for use in health care settings. In collaboration with Risk Authority, a part of Stanford University, he has  been involved in quality improvement projects using Design Thinking Methodology. He has been involved in setting up and running of specialist services, such as the joint assessment clinic with Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine for assessment and treatment of Delusional Infestation and setting up the first service for psychotherapy treatment for self harm for people presenting to the emergency department in Merseyside. He has also collaborated on a number of research projects on the use of digital technology in mental health and is currently the Clinical Lead for Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust in the AVERT project which is funded by Innovate UK for the use of big data to predict risk of relapse of depression and crises.