NHS England’s Ian Dodge visits Health Innovation Manchester

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Health Innovation Manchester welcomed Ian Dodge, NHS National Director Strategy and Innovation, along with colleagues, Dr Mike Prentice, Interim Medical Director (North) and Kathy Scott, Deputy Head of Innovation and Research, to our offices on 17 November.

This is part of a programme of visits that will see Ian visiting each of the 15 licensed Academic Health Science Networks (AHSN) across England, in the run up to formalising AHSN commitments for the next relicensing period.

Health Innovation Manchester had the opportunity to showcase several high-profile local programmes and outline the unique approach to health and social care innovation in a devolved Greater Manchester system.

The visit provided Ian and colleagues with valuable time to discuss in detail some of Greater Manchester’s programmes from research through to adoption, with the conversations very much revolving around impact in terms of benefits to citizens, replicability across England and realising financial savings.

Ian was particularly impressed by several areas of work including COPD, Healthy Hearts, HepC, the NW Utilisation Management Unit and Greater Manchester’s research capabilities.

Ian also took the opportunity to further articulate NHS England’s vision for AHSNs individually and for strengthening collaborative working across the AHSN network, through mechanisms such as the Innovation National Networks (INNs).

Rowena Burns, Executive Chair of Health Innovation Manchester, said “It was really useful to spend some face-to-face time with senior colleagues from NHS England to highlight the additional value being realised from the AHSN as a core component of an Academic Health Science System.

“We have a portfolio of exciting and cutting-edge programmes across the entire discovery-care continuum that have the potential to profoundly improve health outcomes for citizens in Greater Manchester, England, and the rest of the world. It was fantastic to see that NHS colleagues were as excited as we are about the innovations being driven by Health Innovation Manchester and its partners.”

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