Committee D members

Biography

Megan completed undergraduate medical and surgical studies at Imperial College London, with an additional business management degree focussing on health care management. Her medical studies started in the same year as the inception of NICE. This motivated Megan to pursue evidence based medicine and analysis in the provision of NHS therapies, and addressing equity of access to health care, as her continued fields of special interest.

She holds a lead role for priorities and policy with Frimley Health and Care Integrated Care System (ICS) and the wider Thames Valley Region. She is also their clinical lead for individual funding requests and the Evidenced Based Intervention program.

Since completing her training Megan has worked as a general practitioner and practice partner, with special interests in health care service commissioning, cross sector leadership and collaboration, minor surgery, dementia and sexual health. She has also previously been a member of the NIHR late stage funding committee.

Megan started with NICE as a committee member on technology appraisal B before moving in 2021 to committee D as its chair.

Biography

Raju has been a full time consultant paediatric anaesthetist at Birmingham Children’s Hospital since 2008 with a special interest is paediatric cardiac anaesthesia. He is a Secondary care consultant adviser to the board at Berkshire West CCG since December 2015. He is also a member of the NICE Indicators advisory committee and a clinical member for the NHS England Individual funding request (IFR) panel.

Raju holds a MBA degree from Warwick Business School and has a keen interest in NHS finance. He is especially interested in NHS costing and Healthcare Resource Group (HRG) coding and worked on cost saving projects related to this as part of his CCG role.

He worked as a clinical lead for the Cost Recovery Support Team of the UK Department of Health for 15 months in 2015-16 and briefly as a CQC specialist adviser. He has also been part of a national delivery group for "Future Focused Finance" (FFF) which aims to improve the joint working between clinicians and finance professionals.

He has worked as a visiting consultant paediatric anesthesiologist at CS Mott Childrens Hospital, University of Michigan, USA for a year in 2007.

Biography

Martin qualified as a pharmacist in 2003 and has worked as a formulary pharmacist within South East London since 2012, assisting local Committees reviewing the potential introduction of new medicines to the local health economy. He currently works at Guy's and St. Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust and assists with the production and review of local medicine treatment pathways and guidelines in South East London.

Biography

Biography coming soon.

Biography

Paul Caulfield As a recent retiree with a wealth of experience in academia, international finance, and strategic leadership, I am keen to leverage my academic and business skills to make a significant contribution to effective and efficient healthcare technologies. With a distinguished career as Director of Executive Education at NTU, I have imparted knowledge in governance, ethics, leadership, and innovation to aspiring professionals. Prior to my tenure in academia, I held senior management positions at Lehman Brothers, Citibank, and strategic roles at BP, honing my planning and strategic expertise across diverse international markets in the USA, UK, and Asia. I bring extensive experience in governance, collaborating with the Institute of Directors (IoD) on training initiatives and spearheading modules on Business Ethics and Values-based Leadership. Notably, I partnered with Nottinghamshire Integrated Care System (ICS) to design and deliver their Leadership Development program, showcasing my commitment to leadership excellence in healthcare. My career journey includes non-profit board roles and governance positions with several charities and academies, emphasizing my dedication to social impact and education leadership. Additionally, my collaborations with organisations like RSA and Social Enterprise London underscore my proficiency in social business development and strategic planning for social impact. As an academic leader, I have overseen executive training in strategic development and played pivotal roles in market expansion initiatives. Managing a global team of over 30 academics, I successfully orchestrated the delivery of online and physical MBA programs across multiple countries, requiring the formulation and communication of a comprehensive strategy for international adult education. Driven by a passion for education, governance, and strategic leadership, I am excited about the prospect of channeling my skills and experiences into the realm of healthcare to drive meaningful change and innovation with the committees I am working with.

Biography

Craig has worked in NHS management over the last 20 years in a variety of roles with Provider Trusts and Commissioning Organisations. He holds a MSc in Health Economics and Health Policy from the University of Birmingham and holds a business degree from the Aston Business School. He is currently the Director of Strategy and Planning for the NHS Derby and Derbyshire Integrated Care Board and works with partners from the NHS and Local Authority to ensure that high-quality, cost-effective services are available for people living in Derby and Derbyshire.

Biography

Sofia is professor of health technology assessment and part of the leadership team that delivers technology assessment reports for NICE through York's NIHR funded technology assessment reviews programme. She is a statistician with interests in Bayesian methods for evidence synthesis and their application to decision making. Of particular interest are methods for network meta-analysis (indirect and mixed treatment comparisons), bias-adjustment, synthesis of related outcomes and population-adjusted treatment comparisons.

Biography

Andy is a consultant in Public Health and assistant director of Public Health in Lincolnshire. He has a wide range of interests and experience, having taken a first degree in English Literature and had roles in the private sector before pursuing a passion for public sector work that led him into data analysis & epidemiology. This then sparked an interest in Public Health, and Andy trained as a public health specialist and is now a Fellow of the both Faculty of Public Health and the Royal Society for Public Health.

Andy has worked on innovative approaches to the epidemiology of inequalities in health outcomes and healthcare behaviours, and has developed expertise in how different population groups interact with health and care services. He has led locally on Individual Funding Requests, and authored literature reviews for NHS England Specialised Commissioning on new healthcare technologies.

Andy has teaching roles at both the University of Sheffield and the University of Lincoln, and holds a wide portfolio of lead areas locally, including healthy weight, physical activity, smoking, alcohol, healthcare public health and health inequalities.

Biography

Andrew trained in clinical pharmacology, general (internal) medicine, and intensive care medicine in London. In addition to his clinical training, Andrew gained substantial experience in clinical trials research, medicines management, and medical education.

Since 2016, Andrew has practised as an intensive care consultant in a busy regional neurointensive care unit at St George's Hospital, London, where he also chairs the trust's drugs and therapeutics committee. He is chief examiner for the final year of the medicine programme at St George's, University of London, and leads teaching in clinical pharmacology and prescribing.

He is a member of the assessment board for the UK Prescribing Safety Assessment and chairs a question writing group for the Membership of the Royal College of Physicians written examinations.

Biography

Biography to follow.

Biography

Bernard originally trained in the University of Cambridge and obtained a PhD in Zoology as part of the M.B. PhD programme. He then obtained his specialist accreditation in endocrinology and diabetes at St Bartholomew's Hospital, during which time he was appointed Wellcome Trust Advanced Fellow from 2003 to 2006. Since 2009, he has been appointed as senior clinical lecturer and honorary consultant in endocrinology at UCL Medical School and Royal Free Hospital.

His particular specialist interests are in adrenal neuroendocrinology and neuroendocrine tumours, as well as genetic endocrine disorders. He is the lead endocrinologist for the European Neuroendocrine Tumor Society (ENETS) Centre of Excellence Royal Free neuroendocrine tumour multidisciplinary team.

Biography

Ivan is a consultant neuropsychiatrist at the Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. He has interests in the diagnosis and management of neuropsychiatric presentations of cognitive, movement disorders, epilepsy and central nervous system tumours.

He is also a senior clinical researcher at the University of Oxford, where his work focuses on the identification of and intervention in preclinical Alzheimer's disease. He has a particular interest in the repurposing of drugs targeting metabolic compounds for dementia, as well as in the development of digital technology solutions for early diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease.

Ivan completed an integrated clinical academic training in Old Age and General Adult Psychiatry funded by the National Institute of Health Research in the Thames Valley and London Deaneries. Prior to this he completed a PhD at the University of Manchester focusing on clinical trial methodologies for the development of cognitive enhancers for schizophrenia spectrum disorders.

Biography

Guy trained in paediatric oncology in Bristol, Sheffield and Manchester, and completed a PhD in molecular pharmacology of neuroblastoma at the University of Manchester. Since 2002 he has been a clinical senior lecturer and honorary consultant paediatric oncologist at Royal Manchester Children's Hospital.

Guy is co-director of the Manchester Clinical Trials Unit (MCTU) and the national lead for the Paediatric Experimental Cancer Medicines Centre network. Guy is particularly interested in ensuring equity of access to novel treatments across the UK, and in bringing new drugs for children to the clinic more rapidly.

Biography

Philip is a senior health economist at Medtronic with extensive experience within the medical device industry. Philip leads cross functional projects to create environments that enable reimbursement and commissioning of Medical Devices within the UK and republic of Ireland.

Prior to working within the device industry Philip completed his PhD in Chemistry at The University of Manchester followed by post-doctoral research at Imperial College London, before moving into scientific positions within industry.

Philip holds an MSc in International Health Technology Assessment, Pricing and Reimbursement from The University of Sheffield.

Biography

David is a health economist in the Academic Unit of Health Economics, University of Leeds. He has many years of experience in conducting economic evaluations alongside clinical trials, decision-analytic modelling and stated preference studies. He is lead economist on a number of National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), charity and industry-funded projects. Areas of special interest are surgery and haematology.

David leads teaching of an 'Economic evaluation for health technology assessment' module and supervises several PhD students. He regularly contributes to the NIHR Research Design Service and is a member of an NIHR Programme Grants for Applied Research sub-panel.

Biography

Giles began his career as a public sector economist, working for HM Treasury. He spent a number of years working in commercial roles in the life sciences industry, before moving to consultancy.

Giles has a BSc Economics from the London School of Economics, an MSc Economics from University College London and an MSc in Health Economics Policy and Management from the London School of Economics. His research interests include methods for the evaluation of potentially curative health technologies and use of surrogate endpoints in health technology assessment, with an international perspective.

Biography

Biography to follow

Biography

Dr Paula Parvulescu, MD, MSc, MPH, FFPH Paula is a Consultant in Public Health Medicine at the Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, where she is leading the Trust’s prevention and equity agenda, helping the Trust to improve outcomes, particularly for the most vulnerable. Prior to this role, she worked as a Consultant in Public Health Medicine in Liverpool City Council, leading the healthcare public health portfolio.

Paula is passioned about reducing inequalities, increasing value for money and maximising the impact of NHS resources.

Paula trained as a Public Health Physician and holds a MSc degree in Health Policy, Economics and Management from Maastricht University in the Netherlands. She completed her post-doctoral studies as a research fellow in translational medicine at the Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids) in Toronto, Canada.

In her previous roles, Paula worked as a health economics and outcomes research consultant and in academia as a public health lecturer.

Biography

Biography to follow

Biography

Ben is a GP Partner across a five site, 25,000 patient, training practice in Durham. He is the quality improvement and audit lead focussing on medication optimisation and utilising new communication technologies to improve patient care.

Ben is a researcher at Newcastle University. He has interests in Care Home Medicine and Health Economics.

Biography

Sophia is a consultant rheumatologist at King’s College Hospital NHS foundation trust, appointed in 2006. As part of the rheumatology team at King’s she contributes to a large secondary and tertiary level service for rheumatic diseases, providing care to patients across the age spectrum in Southeast London and the wider region.

Sophia’s main areas of clinical interest are in the inflammatory arthropathies. Whilst a clinical lecturer at KCL she undertook research leading to a PhD exploring the genetic determinants of susceptibility and severity in rheumatoid arthritis. Her clinical practice encompasses early arthritis, axial spondyloarthropathies, psoriatic and rheumatoid arthritides. She also has an interest in connective tissue disease associated interstitial lung disease. She was lead clinician for rheumatology for 9 years. She has had an active role in training locally and regionally, and was training program director for rheumatology in South London for 6 years. Sophia is also currently a member of the Board of Trustees of the British Society for Rheumatology. Her term of office comes to an end in late 2024.

Biography

Will is a consultant health economist with an interest in health technology assessment.

Since completing his PhD in health economics in 2014, he has worked with pharmaceutical companies to build evidence submissions for appraisal by NICE and other public bodies, and taught health economics to undergraduate university students.

Will also has recent experience working with Peninsula Technology Assessment Group, providing independent review and critique of evidence submissions to the NICE Single Technology Appraisal process.

Biography

Savvas is an ICU Consultant and the lead for data and reporting at the Department of Critical Care Medicine, King’s College Hospital, London. He is also an honorary senior Lecturer at the King’s College London School of Cardio-Vascular Medicine and Sciences and a Distance Learning tutor for the Epidemiology programme at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM).

He holds an MSc in Epidemiology from the LSHTM and an MSc in Healthcare decision making from the London School of Economics. His areas of clinical and academic interest include acquired brain injury after trauma or cardiac arrest, and HTA.

Biography

Dr Waqar is a GP in Berkshire with several portfolio roles.

He completed an NIHR Academic Clinical Fellowship in General Practice at the University of Oxford, where he also obtained a scholarship for an MSc in Evidence Based Health Care. He has further postgraduate qualifications in medical education, women’s health, legal medicine, and occupational medicine. 

He is an alumnus of the National Medical Director’s Fellowship at the Faculty of Medical Leadership and Management. He is a GP training programme director and the Royal College of GPs faculty education lead in the Thames Valley. He has an honorary academic appointment at Imperial College London and holds several grants to research health inequalities in faith communities.

Biography

Sue is a senior pharmacist and antimicrobial prescriber who has trained and developed her career in the NHS over the past decade. She holds several clinical and strategic roles in antimicrobial, outpatient parenteral antimicrobial therapy (OPAT), high cost medicines commissioning and medicines finance. Alongside her colleagues, she implemented the OPAT service in Lincolnshire that enables patients to be treated with IV antimicrobials at home or in their own environment.

She has undertaken clinical research and publications, and sits on a national steering group in developing educational programmes on medicines commissioning and reimbursement. She has also been involved in implementing policies and access for highly specialised therapies, including biologics, immunoglobulins and innovative treatments.

Sue has a strong interest in health economics and health inequality, and aims to add value in improving medicines access through HTA process, commissioning policies, and drug-service development. She holds a MSc in Health Economics, Policy and Management from the London School of Economics and Political Science.

Biography

Dr Zenas Yiu is a clinical senior lecturer in Dermatology and Pharmacoepidemiology at the University of Manchester, and an Honorary Consultant Dermatologist at the Northern Care Alliance NHS Foundation Trust.

His clinical and research interests are in the effectiveness and safety of therapeutics for inflammatory skin conditions, and he currently works in regional tertiary clinics for psoriasis and hidradenitis suppurativa. He holds a master’s degree in epidemiology and a doctorate degree in pharmaco-epidemiology.

He sits on the steering committee for three British Association of Dermatologists (BAD) research registries on psoriasis, alopecia areata, and keratinocyte cancer; and works as the chair and a member for the methotrexate and biologics guideline development groups for the BAD respectively. He also works as an editor for Cochrane Skin and an associate editor for the BJD for guidelines.