The Judges
Dr Glyn Hayes – chair
Dr Glyn Hayes is a medical practitioner who was a GP in Worcester for 25 years. He has been involved with health informatics since the late 70s when he designed one of first consulting room GP computer systems. Glyn is the former chair of the Health Informatics Forum Strategic Panel. He was a founder member of the Primary Health Care Specialist Group of the BCS, its chair from 1985 to 1990 and is currently its president. He is also president of the UK Council for Health Informatics Professionals.
He was the medical director for one of the largest NHS IT suppliers of IT from 1992 until he retired from this post in 2001. He has represented the UK on the International Medical Informatics Association and was the chair of the primary care working Group of IMIA. He has lectured widely around the world and been a keynote speaker at many international conferences.
His informatics interests include making systems which clinicians want to use, improving individual patient care by the application of IT and developing health Informatics into a substantive profession.
Heather Strachan
Heather Strachan has over 20 years experience in eHealth. She is currently The Nursing, Midwifery and Allied Health Professions eHealth Lead in the eHealth Directorate in the Scottish Government. Heather, who is a nurse by background, has held a variety of posts, which have involved management, practice development, research and healthcare governance. Heather has a Masters in Information Science from London’s City University. She is a Professional Member of the British Computer Society and a member of the Centre for Health Informatics Research and Development. Heather is a Senior Member of the International Medical Informatics Association and an Honorary Member of their Nursing Informatics Group.
Linda Davidson
Linda is a director and co-founder of E-Health Media Ltd, publishers of E-Health Insider and EHI Primary Care. A healthcare journalist, and editor, Linda is a former editor of Nursing Times (1988-92) and editorial director of Macmillan Magazines health division (now, publishers of Nursing Times and the Health Service Journal).
Gwyn Thomas
Gwyn returned to Wales in 2005 to join Informing Healthcare as chief executive. Previously, he was chief executive of the NHS Information Authority (NHSIA), which was responsible for developing and managing national infrastructure services that supported the delivery of patient care across the NHS in England. Gwyn led the NHSIA through a highly productive period; overseeing its creation from the merger of a number of pre-existing organisations and shaping it to deliver an extensive portfolio of high profile national projects and services.
Before joining the NHSIA, Gwyn was a board member of a large acute teaching hospital in England with executive responsibilities at various times for patient involvement, clinical and corporate governance, information and IM&T, quality improvement, corporate communications and risk management. Prior to joining the NHS, Gwyn worked in the Electricity Generating Industry in Australia, the UK, France, Hong Kong and India. Gwyn is a visiting professor at Brunel University.
Daniel Ray
Daniel has been in the NHS for just over 10 years, starting out in an acute trust in Worcester covering a variety of information disciplines. He then became Head of Information at Dudley PCT where he developed web based case management systems that were rolled out to PCTs across the county, along with being at the inception of practice based commissioning.
He then worked on the establishment of the West Midlands Commissioning Business Support Agency before moving to University Hospital Birmingham NHS FT as Head of Informatics and now Director of Informatics & Patient Admin, where he has been for the last 2 years. Here he has worked on a series of ways to monitor delivery of quality of care using health data, along with lecturing on this and to establish a Quality Outcomes Research Unit which was the winning entry in the e-health insider awards 2008.
Brendan Major
Brendan joined BT in February 2007 as client engagement director for BT Health London. Working closely with NHS Connecting for Health, Brendan is responsible for ensuring that BT and trusts are both properly engaged with the programme of deployments that are taking place across the capital. Brendan joined BT from Barts and the London NHS Trust where, for the past four years, he was director of ICT running an IT hub serving seven NHS trusts. Whilst at Barts he was also the director of infrastructure for the National Programme for IT in London. Brendan joined the NHS after 10 years as a lecturer and IT director for a major charity.
Jon Hoeksma
E-Health Media co-founder and director
An editor and journalist with 10 years experience of the healthcare sector. Jon is a former editor of Health Manager Today, and reported on health IT issues for a variety of publications including Computer Weekly, the Health Service Journal, Reuters Health and British Journal of Healthcare Management. Before entering journalism Jon was an NHS graduate trainee working in Southampton, chiefly in primary care. He graduated from the University of Warwick in 1991.
Lindsey Birnsteel
Head of Technology/Research, E-Health Media
Lindsey holds an MSc (with distinction) in Information Systems Management from the London School of Economics and Political Science. Her thesis focused on e-health trends and healthcare information technology issues, with a particular emphasis on the UK's National Programme for IT. Her most recent work experience includes quality assurance at a marketing firm in Virginia, USA, and freelance marketing for a medical software company. Lindsey joined E-Health Media in February 2007 and is head of technology and research. She is also a professional member of the British Computer Society.
Lyn Whitfield
Managing Editor, E-Health Insider
Lyn is a graduate of Oxford University and the London School of Economics, from which she holds an MSc in public policy and planning. She has been a journalist for more than a decade. Lyn started her journalism career on local newspapers, but went on to develop an interest in the public sector and technology. She joined E-Health Insider as managing director in 2008, after five years as a freelance writer, editor and project manager working for health service organisations and think-tanks as well as newspapers and magazines.
