Meet the people at Health Innovation Wessex

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The Board

The Board steers us into an exciting future of innovation, while ensuring we deliver against the objectives licensed by NHS England. Our approach of close partnership working with our members - and the other elements of the NHS system - is underpinned by mutual Board representation. We are committed to joint decision making on 'who does what,' aligning resources, and undertaking joint work.

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Who we are

Senior Leadership Team

Our senior leadership team brings a broad range of experience and skills to provide direction and oversight across our work. The executive team is accountable to our Board.

Fiona Driscoll
Chair

Fiona specialises in designing transformation strategies and operational plans to deliver success...
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Nicola Bent
Chief Executive

Nicola joined Health Innovation Wessex in April 2020 from the National Institute for Health and C...
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Frank Ratcliff
Director of Industry and Innovation

After a PhD in the genetics at the Sainsbury Laboratory, Frank quickly moved into commercial rese...
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Sarah Turl
Associate Director - Operations

Sarah has over 30 years’ experience in a variety of management roles, operating across the public...
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Richard Booth
Deputy CEO and Director of Innovation Adoption

Richard joined Health Innovation Wessex in March 2024 from his role as Director for Companion App...
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Philippa Darnton
Director of Insight

Meet the Team

Our staff come from a diverse range of backgrounds, including academia, frontline health and social care, research, analytics and NHS support services.

Kim Appleby
Senior Communications and Strategy Manager

Kim joined Health Innovation Wessex in April 2023. Prior to this, she spent six years working as ...
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Patrick Arnold
Programme Manager Innovation Adoption

Patrick Arnold is an Innovation Adoption Programme Manager with a focus on Primary Care.
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Rachel Bailey
Senior Programme Manager - Insight

Rachel Bailey joined Health Innovation Wessex in April 2022 as a Senior Programme Manager in the ...
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Ruth Barker (PhD)
Evaluation Programme Manager

Ruth joined the organisation in April 2021. She has ten years’ clinical experience working as a p...
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Sophie Barton
Evaluation Programme Analyst (on maternity leave)

Sophie joined the organisation in May 2019 with seven years’ experience of working in healthcare ...
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Divya Beri
Business Support Assistant

Divya has been working for the NHS since 2021 and specialise in project support, communications, ...
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Jackie Chandler
Evaluation Programme Manager (Qualitative)

Jackie has a background in general and mental health nursing in both the NHS and voluntary sector...
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Gemma Clarke
Innovation Adoption Support Assistant

Gemma is an Innovation Adoption Support Assistant who joined Health Innovation Wessex in November...
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Jenny Curtis
Innovation Adoption Support Assistant

Jenny is an Innovation Adoption Support Assistant who joined Health Innovation Wessex in 2023.
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Cheryl Davies
Senior Programme Manager Innovation Adoption - (HIOW locality)

Cheryl Davies has worked for the NHS for over 18 years. Her background is in statistics and she h...
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Emmanuel Defever
Qualitative Evaluation Programme Coordinator

Emmanuel joined the Insight team in May 2022 as a qualitative evaluation programme coordinator.
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Angus Donald
Programme Manager, Industry and Innovation

Angus brings a wealth of commercial experience across a range of medical device categories and ma...
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Linda du Preez
Programme Co-ordinator Innovation Adoption

Linda is a Programme Co-ordinator for Health Innovation Wessex within the Innovation Adoption team.
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Katherine Gale
Evaluation Programme Manager (Qualitative)

Katherine is the Programme Manager for mental health. Katherine joined the organisation in Novemb...
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Holly Green
Patient Safety Programme Manager / Maternity & Neonatal Safety Improvement Programme

Holly joined Health Innovation Wessex in February 2024. She completed her BMid (Hons) degree in 2...
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Ani Haughton
Industry and Innovation Support Assistant

Ani Haughton is the Support Assistant for the Industry and Innovation team.
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Rachel Heard-White
Data Analyst and Quality Lead

Rachel has worked across the private, public, and charity sectors. After completing a bachelor’s ...
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Catherine Henderson
Patient Safety Programme Manager

Catherine is a Patient Safety Programme Manager who has joined HIW from a national patient safety...
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Emily Hunter
Senior Programme Manager - Insight

Emily is the Senior Programme Manager for Insight. She is an experienced programme manager with e...
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Sam Kehoe-Coulter
EA to CEO & Strategic Programme Coordinator

Sam is Executive Assistant to the Chief Executive Officer and has over 15 years experience in a w...
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Helen Kelley
Business Support Assistant

Helen has over twenty years’ experience working in Administration and five years in Event Managem...
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Simeon Kent
Innovation Adoption Programme Manager

Simeon Kent joined HIW in 2022 as the Innovation Adoption Programme Coordinator.
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Nikki King
Programme Manager Innovation Adoption

Nikki is the Workstream Lead for the NHSE Medicines Safety Improvement Programme. She is a regist...
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Amanda Lees PhD
Evaluation Programme Manager (Qualitative) - Insight

Amanda has a background in health and social care-focused research and evaluation, having worked ...
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Vicky Martin
EA to Deputy CEO & Strategic Programme Assistant