Plans for partnership in North West London aim to bring innovations to healthcare

North West London healthcare providers and Imperial College London explore potential for new Academic Health Science Partnership - News release

Imperial College London News Release issued on behalf of the proposed Academic Health Science Partnership

For Immediate Release
Friday 25 November 2011

Imperial College London and healthcare providers in North West London today announce plans to form a new partnership to improve the health and care of the local population of 1.9 million people.

The new Academic Health Science Partnership (AHSP) is intended to bring together providers of primary, secondary, tertiary, community and mental healthcare to work with Imperial College London to pursue higher quality care for patients. The partners hope to launch the AHSP formally in April 2012.

The first partnership of its kind in North West London, it will support collaborative approaches to innovating in healthcare. With Imperial College London as an academic partner, the AHSP will present opportunities to conduct clinical trials at a large and meaningful scale and to apply research findings to benefit a greater number of patients. The AHSP could also take a leading role in training and educating healthcare professionals.

The proposal to develop the AHSP has been formulated by Professor the Lord Darzi, Paul Hamlyn Chair of Surgery at Imperial College London and formerly Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Health. He said: “The partners involved in developing the AHSP face many common challenges but have one unifying goal: to bring the highest quality care to the people of North West London. By focusing on our strengths and systematically implementing what is known across the partnership about providing the best clinical care through innovation, we should achieve much more than we could apart. Our simple ambition is to use all of our academic and clinical expertise to improve the quality of care for our North West London population as a whole.”

The healthcare providers behind plans for the AHSP already deliver a range of world-class services, including the treatment of cancer, cardiovascular diseases, mental health conditions and women’s and children’s health. The AHSP would seek to use the expertise of each member to develop a programme of innovations that benefit all healthcare across North West London.

Lord Darzi has agreed to be the Chairman of the Transitional Partnership Board that will confirm the membership of the AHSP, which may include other healthcare and education partners, and determine its organisational and legal structure. The Board will include as members the Rector of Imperial College London, the Chief Executives of the Trusts which have agreed to progress plans, and a GP representative. The AHSP is expected to be launched in April 2012 as a company limited by guarantee in which members will hold equal rights.

Imperial College London and the Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust are partners in the Imperial Academic Health Science Centre (AHSC) formed in 2007. The AHSC will continue to integrate healthcare services with teaching and research between the College and the Trust, and will be complementary to the AHSP. The College and Trust will join the AHSP as separate members.

The institutions and healthcare providers that have agreed to progress plans for the AHSP are:

• Central London Community Healthcare NHS Trust
• Central North West London NHS Foundation Trust
• Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
• Ealing Hospital NHS Trust
• Hillingdon Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
• Hounslow and Richmond Community Healthcare NHS Trust*
• Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust
• Imperial College London
• North West London Hospitals NHS Trust
• Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Foundation Trust
• West London Mental Health Trust
• West Middlesex University Hospital NHS Trust

Reactions from Chief Executives/Chairmen of the proposed partners of the AHSP:

Claire Murdoch, Chief Executive of Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust said: “We want to see world leading outcomes for patients in relation to their health - longer life expectancy and a better quality of life. In order to achieve this there must be collaboration across and between services and the physical and psychological needs of patients must be seen as a whole. CNWL is hopeful that the AHSP partnership could be major step forward in achieving this.”

James A. Reilly, Chief Executive of Central London Community Healthcare NHS Trust, said: “We very much look forward to our involvement in the Academic Health Science Partnership for North West London, and the opportunity it creates to share expertise across the healthcare sector. Collaboration is essential, to ensure effective, integrated, quality services that will benefit our local patients.”

Heather Lawrence, Chief Executive of Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We are delighted to be part of Lord Darzi's initiative in bringing together Imperial College with 11 NHS organisations to form an Academic Health Science Partnership in North West London. This is good news for the 1.9 million people who live in North West London and for staff because together we can develop innovative solutions and translate research into practice to improve the quality of healthcare and health outcomes for patients.”

Julie Lowe, Chief Executive of Ealing Hospital NHS Trust, which incorporates the community services of Brent, Ealing and Harrow as an integrated care organisation said: “We are delighted to be part of the AHSP bringing together Imperial College and 11 NHS organisations in North West London. Together we can remain separate organisations but develop innovative solutions which translate research into practice to improve healthcare for 1.9 million people. As an integrated organisation we are particularly interested in work that closely links routine patient care in the community with leading edge research.”

David McVittie, Chief Executive of The Hillingdon Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, said: “This is great news for patients and the wider population across North West London as it will enable all the Trusts to work with the researchers and scientists at Imperial to drive forward improvements in health care over the coming years."

Richard Tyler, Chief Executive of the Hounslow and Richmond Community Healthcare NHS Trust*, said: “Being part of the AHSP is an exciting opportunity which will enable us to deliver better clinical care and outcomes for our patients. With so much focus on moving care o u t of hospitals it is important that community health services are involved in cutting edge resea rch and development.”

Mark Davies, Chief Executive of Imperial College Healt hcare NHS Trust, said: “The creation of an AHSP is a fantasti c opportunity to further improve the quality of healthcare provided to the population of North West London. C loser working with a range of community and acute providers will allow us to conduct a greater number of large scale cutting-edge research studies and translate their findings into vastly improved patient care. The partnership will also facilitate better sharing of innovation and best practice in the delivery of integrated care, education and training to drive up the quality of care our patients receive.”

Sir Keith O’Nions, Rector of Imperial College London, said: “Lord Darzi has developed a convincing vision for achieving higher quality care for patients through innovation, and for strengthening Imperial’s links with healthcare providers across North West London, opening new doors for all. He has achieved widespread support for his proposals and I look forward to working with the other partners to shape the AHSP.

Bob Bell, Chief Executive of Royal Brompton & Harefield NHS Foundation Trust, said: “Royal Brompton & Harefield has a strong and established relationship with Imperial College; we already jointly run two Biomedical Research Units with government funding of £20 million, were founding partners in Imperial’s Academic Health Science System in June 2010, and our published research collaborations are regularly the most highly cited in Europe for cardiac, cardiovascular, critical and respiratory care. We are therefore extremely pleased to be part of this wider Academic Health Science Partnership which we believe will bring demonstrable benefit to patients in North West London and throughout the UK, as well as to clinical research and medical science.”

Peter Cubbon, Chief Executive of West London Mental Health NHS Trust said: “At West London Mental Health NHS Trust we welcome this opportunity to share with and learn from leaders in their respective fields, new ways of delivering the benefits of clinical innovations to patients more quickly and efficiently. We're pleased that mental health is a priority programme for this collaboration and look forward to taking a leading role, in line with our vision of excellence in R&D, teaching and service delivery.”

Dame Jacqueline Docherty, Chief Executive of West Middlesex University Hospital NHS Trust, said: “We welcome the opportunity for West Middlesex University Hospital NHS Trust and its clinicians to contribute to the proposed Academic Health Sciences Partnership. We already work closely with Imperial College in medical education and look forward to working more closely with Imperial and with other local healthcare providers on research projects that will lead to improved health outcomes for patients not only in west London but also further afield.”

Professor Rory Shaw, Medical Director of The North West London Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “Joining the Academic Health Science Partnership for North West London would sit well with our research mission – to promote world-class research that addresses the health and wellbeing of our local population and beyond. We aim to provide an advanced level of healthcare that is based upon sound collaborations and the latest scientific developments for the benefit of the community.”

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* Addendum: Hounslow and Richmond Community Healthcare NHS Trust was not among the partners that established the AHSP, Imperial College Health Partners, in June 2012. See news story.

For more information about the proposed AHSP contact:

Caroline Davis

Head of Communications
Imperial College London
Tel: +44 (0)20 7594 6699
Email: c.davis@imperial.ac.uk

Out of hours duty press officer: +44 (0)7803 886248

Professor the Lord Darzi of Denham PC, KBE – biographical information

Professor The Lord Darzi of Denham, KBE, PC, FmedSci, HonFREng holds the Paul Hamlyn Chair of Surgery in the Department of Surgery and Cancer at Imperial College London. He is an Honorary Consultant Surgeon at Imperial College Hospital NHS Trust and the Royal Marsden Hospital and holds the Chair of Surgery at the Institute of Cancer Research. He was appointed as Chairman for the Institute of Global Health Innovation at Imperial College London in 2010.

Research led by Professor Darzi is directed towards achieving best surgical practice through both innovation in surgery and enhancing the safety and quality of healthcare. He has published over 600 peer-reviewed research papers to date.

He was knighted for his services in medicine and surgery in 2002. In 2007 Professor Darzi was introduced to the United Kingdom’s House of Lords as Professor the Lord Darzi of Denham and appointed as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department of Health. In this role he led a major review of the NHS which was followed by publication of his report ‘High Quality Care For All'. He relinquished this position in July 2009 when he was appointed the United Kingdom’s Global Ambassador for Health and Life Sciences, and Chair of NHS Global as well as United Kingdom Business Ambassador, an appointment re-confirmed in 2010 by Prime Minister David Cameron. Lord Darzi was appointed as a member of Her Majesty’s Most Honourable Privy Council in June 2009.