Talk to me about: Strategy, IT Systems and Interoperability, Data Standards, Security and Information Governance
John is our Data and Informatics Director and has been with us since the GLH was established in 2018. He and his team work to support and develop the IT and Bioinformatics systems and standards needed to help us deliver a fully integrated Genomic Medicine Service.
Working with colleagues at our partner Trusts, other GMS regions, and with specialist providers such as Genomics England, John and his team are responsible for ensuring that IT systems work safely and effectively across our organisations, ensuring staff have the tools they need to support our patients.
Initially qualifying as a Mathematical Physicist, John studied as an undergraduate at Edinburgh University, then worked as a researcher at Durham University before switching careers to IT in the late 1990’s.
John has worked as a programmer, DBA, development manager, system architect, and Chief Technology Officer (CTO), working for several successful international dotcom companies, including Verisign and AOL Time Warner.
In 2010, John joined the NHS, working across the Newcastle-upon-Tyne Hospitals Trust in areas including Radiology, Pathology, Maternity, Cancer Services and Community services, as well as their Cerner Millennium Electronic Patient Record system, before switching to Genomics full-time in 2018.
John is passionate that effective IT should be an enabler of change within the NHS. Getting the right information into the hands of our clinicians and patients, at the time that they need it, allows them to make the best-informed decisions.