Medical Centre

On Wednesday 22 November 2017, I spoke at an event organised by the North and West London Faculty of the Royal College of General Practitioners. The event was aimed at ‘First Five’ general practitioners. I spoke on the topic of opportunities in research. The event was chaired by Dr Camille Gajria and Dr Nilesh Bharakhada. Other speakers at the conference included Dr Ian Goodman, Chair Hillingdon CCG, who spoke on the topic of emerging opportunities for GPs through new models of care; Dr Sohail Hussain who spoke on media opportunities; Dr Krishan Aggarwal who spoke on finance; Dr Shivani Tanna who spoke on teaching opportunities; Dr Sonia Tsukagoshi who spoke on international opportunities; and Dr Nilesh Bharakhada who spoke on the Care Information Exchange and opportunities in technology for GPs. The event was a good opportunity for First Five GPs to learn about career opportunities in London and also update themselves on areas such as personal finance and key developments in the NHS ...

In a study published in BMJ Safety and Quality , we evaluated mortality differences between weekend and weekday emergency stroke admissions in England over time. We aimed to determine whether a reconfiguration of stroke services in Greater London was associated with a change in this mortality difference. We extracted patient-level data from national routinely collected administrative data (Hospital Episode Statistics or HES) from 1 January 2008 to 31 December 2014. Records include information of all admissions to English National Health Service (NHS) hospital trusts. Each patient record contains information on demographics (such as sex, age and ethnicity), the episode of care (such as trust name, date of admission) and diagnosis. Our study covers a 30-month period before (January 2008 to June 2010) the reorganisation of stroke service in Greater London, and a 54-month period afterwards (July 2010 to December 2014). All admissions during the same period in the rest of England were ...

General practices in England are independent businesses that are contracted to provide primary care for specified populations. Most are owned by general practitioners, but many types of organisation are now eligible to deliver these services. In a study published in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine , we examined the association between patient experience and the contract type of general practices in England, distinguishing limited companies from other practices. We analysed data from the English General Practice Patient Survey 2013–2014 (July to September 2013 and January to March 2014). Patients were eligible for inclusion in the survey if they had a valid National Health Service number, had been registered with a general practice for six months or more, and were aged 18 years or over. All general practices in England with eligible patients were included in the survey (n = 8017). Patients registered to general practices owned by limited companies reported worse experi...

Members of the School of Public Health held a very productive and informative meeting today with senior members of Imperial College including Sarah Waterbury, Vice President (Advancement); Maggie Dallman, Associate Provost (Academic Partnerships); Angela Bowen, Director of Development (Faculty of Medicine); and Tom Pearson, Head of Special Projects (Academic Partnerships). The Department of Primary Care & Public Health in the School of Public Health works with local community stakeholders – such as voluntary groups, local authorities, and general practitioners – on a range of community-based outreach projects. These projects aim to improve the health and wellbeing of local residents; improve access to professional careers for children from deprived backgrounds; and give medical students experience of working with deprived and marginalised groups to develop skills in health coaching and behavioural change. This work is in addition to the very high-quality teaching and research ...