Making the wrong choices when storing or sharing sensitive data can lead to data losses and leaks, resulting in serious repercussions for you and for Imperial College. Encrypting data is the best way to make information unreadable, meaning it can only be read using a digital key to unlock it, called decryption. You should encrypt all sensitive data before storing or sharing.What’s sensitive data?Sensitive Data can include research data, personal data and commercially-sensitive data. If in doubt, encrypt it!How do I encrypt information and devices?It’s possible to encrypt documents, USB drives, laptops, mobile phones andemails. Find out how at the Be Secure website: Encrypt sensitiveinformation.Where can I save information securely?It’s best to use College’s recommended and backed-up central file storage andsharing options (H Drive, group space, One Drive for Business). Find out moreabout storage and sharing options available to you at the Be Securewebsite: Store sensitive information securely Share sensitive information securelyInformation Security training'Common Threats and How to Counter Them' covering Data Encryption, is justone of the modules in College's new Information Security Awareness training,available now for all staff to complete.To access, follows steps at Information Security Awareness trainingContact: If you have any problems accessing the course, contact the ICTService Desk.
School of Public Health Athena SWAN Lecture Professor Deborah Ashby In February this year the School of Public Health Athena SWAN Lecture was presented by Deborah Ashby, Interim Head of the School of Public Health at Imperial College London. Professor Ashby holds the Chair in Medical Statistics and Clinical Trials, and was Founding Co-Director of Imperial Clinical Trials Unit. She is a Chartered Statistician and her research interests are in clinical trials, risk-benefit decision making for medicines, and the utility of Bayesian approaches in these areas. She led the benefit-risk work stream of the IMI-funded PROTECT project, bringing together academic, pharmaceutical, regulatory and patient expertise to determine best practice, and innovate on both underpinning methods and communication of the benefits and risks of medicines. She chairs the HTA Commissioning Board, and is Deputy Chair of the HTA Programme for the National Institute for Health Research, and is Chair of the Population Research Committee for Cancer Research UK. She has sat on the Commission on Human Medicines and acts as adviser to the European Medicines Agency. Deborah was awarded the OBE for services to medicine in 2009, appointed an NIHR Senior Investigator in 2010, elected a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 2012 and is currently President-Elect of the Royal Statistical Society. Statistical theory, making epidemiological observations and carrying out incisive analyses to understand those observations, and designing and carrying out elegant clinical trials are all absorbing, challenging academic activities in their own right. However, sometimes we can be left wondering, “So what?” Using those underpinning sciences to make a tangible difference to people’s health sometimes means going the extra mile, and venturing into worlds beyond the ivory tower. Drawing on her experiences from the worlds of academia, drug regulation and research funding, Deborah looked at some examples that have made a difference, reflecting on both the scientific underpinnings, and the pathways to making an impact as well as her personal reflections on that journey. Find out more about how the Imperial College School of Public Health achieved its Athena SWAN Silver Award for supporting the careers of women in science.
Recruiting for Work Experience Project WATCCH II- Widening Access to Careers in Community Healthcare Once again, the Undergraduate Primary Care Education team here at PCPH, is running our work experience programme for the second year called WATCCH II – Widening Access to Careers in Community Healthcare II. There is a shortage of work experience in the health sector for pupils, particularly for those who have no connection to healthcare professionals. WATCCH II aims to open up work experience opportunities in the healthcare sector by offering placements for sixth form pupils from disadvantaged backgrounds to shadow various allied healthcare professionals in general practices. These 16/17 year olds have completed their GCSEs with good grades, do not have placements elsewhere, and are the first in their family applying to university. It was a tremendous success last year and the pupils thoroughly enjoyed the project. They gained valuable knowledge and insight into their own personal skills, understanding the complex patient- clinical
relationship and understanding the variety of healthcare roles on offer in theNHS. The experience greatlyhelped formulate careerchoices they wished to enterand plan the process onachieving their future careers.Their reflections are shown inthis adjacent text map:40 Pupils will be invited to attend a pre-placement induction at Imperial College's Charing Cross Hospital Campus, and will then have a 3-day work experience session at a general practice over thesummer where they will observe a variety of allied healthcare professionals inthe community, e.g. health visitors, phlebotomists, pharmacists, nurses andphysiotherapists.This is an exciting opportunity for you to help change pupils' perceptions ofwider healthcare careers, how primary care works and to allow them to utilisetheir experience with you in their application form.If you are a GP or other allied healthcare professional interested in participating in the WATCCH project, find out more by emailing WATCCH
A visit to the University of LimerickThe University of Limerick has appointed a new Professor of Primary Care, ProfessorLiam Glynn to lead their graduate entry programme taught by rural Irish GPs.Professor Liam Glynn (Ireland), Professor Sonia The theme this year was reinforcing the GP-Saxena, Professor Brian Bourke (Iowa), Professor student relationship. Students who have an 18David Hirsch (Cambridge Massachussetts) longitudinal attachment came together with GP educators and researchers came together in this GP Tutor workshop titled: ‘Better Together’. The aim was to launch a GP Research Network. Professor Sonia Saxena gave a keynote lecture: ‘Why research in General Practice matters and why get involved’. Professor David Hirsch gave an after dinner lecture on how the longitudinal clerkship model enhances student learning. In the end both speakers were presented with commissioned paintings by a local artist.UAE Innovations Diploma with Imperial College Business SchoolProf Sonia Saxena is among 10 executive coaches drawn from across Imperial to work withthe UAE presidential office, who have commissioned a bespoke 70 participants modular 18month diploma course for policy makers.Sonia visited Dubai to give a master class on Child make healthy diet/exercise fun. They have workedObesity to the wider group and act as a technical collaboratively on problem definition, heldcoach to her group who have called themselves stakeholder discussion and successfully landed a‘Generation H’ (for health) . They are addressing sponsorship deal for their idea which is now beingthe problem of child obesity in United Arab piloted across the 7 Emirates. February is anEmirates. They have devised a project idea of a innovations month in the UAE and they will pitch'smart classroom’. their project and progress in a Dragon’s Den style competition that may see their idea supported inThe overall aim was to co-ordinate children, new policy by the government office.parents and schools in a collaborative way and to
STUDY TOUR: NHSLast December, the WHO Collaborating Centre hosted a delegation from Georgia’sNational Center for Disease Control and Public Health for a study tour to the UK NHS andPublic Health in England to learn and exchange experiences and observations.The delegation was led by the Director General of research hub at Imperial College NHS Trust. Studythe National Centre for Disease Control and Public Tours were organised in collaboration withHealth of Georgia, Dr Amiran Gamkrelidze. The Colleagues from the NHS and are a hugely valuedparticipants visited Public Health England to meet opportunity for professionals from other countriescolleagues from Health Improvement team, North to familiarise themselves with the organisationalWest London health protection team, local intricacies of the British National Health Service,authorities, Primary Care centre, British Medical which serves as an example to other healthJournal, Faulty of Public Health and Public Health systems.VISIT from Austrian studentsFor the past few years, February has been bringing very interesting visitors to the WHOCollaborating Centre: students from Austrian Carinthia University of Applied Sciences.They were interested in the work of the WHOCollaborating Centre for Public Health Educationand Training as well as Imperial College London ingeneral. The links between WHO CC and CarinthiaUniversity of Applied Sciences have been tied fromyears of cooperation. WHO CC have hosted anumber of interns from Austria who contributedexcellent projects during their time with theCentre.More information on the past Austrian students’workLearning from the UK Palliative Care systemWHO Collaborating Centre for Public Health Education and Training prides itself onorganisation of study tours that respond to the participants’ needs and interests. In thatvein, a study tour to Palliative Care system in the UK took place 7-9 Feburary 2018.It was organised for Croatian representatives of in Sutton, Maggie’s Cancer Care Centre. TheyHealth Centres, Medical School and Universities benefitted from the talks and presentations fromacross Croatia (Ljubuški, Effectus Finance and Law the Royal Marsden Hospital team; Jennifer Karno,School at the University of Zagreb, Clinical Hospital Senior Palliative Care Nurse at the ICL NHS Trustin Zagreb, Zagreb Medical School, Community and Dr. Catherine Urch, palliative care and specialHealth Centre in Dubrovnik, Medical Centre in pain management expert. They went back toMetković, University Hospital Centre in Split, Croatia enriched with observations, knowledge andUniversity of Zagreb Medical School). Participants thoughts as well as inspired to implement changespaid visits to Trinity Hospice in Wandsworth, to the Croatian palliative care system.Ellenor Hospice in Dartford, St. Raphael’s Hospice
Study Tour: NHS risk assessment programme (NHS health Check) across England: a systematic review (E Dubois, ALast summer, the WHO Collaborating Centre Majeed, S Rawaf)’ on behalf of Elizabeth Dubois.hosted a delegation from China for a study tour towitness first-hand the UK NHS. Dr Jie ShenStudy Tours are organised in collaboration with Dr Jie Shen, a medicalColleagues from the NHS and are a hugely valued doctor in Cognitive andopportunity for professionals from other Emotional Neurosciencecountries to familiarise themselves with the from China, spent threeorganisational intricacies of the British National months with WhoHealth Service, which serves as an example to Collaborating Centreother health systems. focusing on research and attending relevantIntroduction to Leadership and clinics within NHS.Communication in Medicine: August 7-11, 2017, Dubrovnik, Republic of Research on a Public Health CampaignCroatia on Twitter at the EUSPR ConferenceThis course was developed and run jointly In september, Dr. Hossam Alakhrass, a doctoralbetween the Zagreb Institute of Culture of Health student at PCPH, presented his research on aand the WHO Collaborating Centre for Public public health campaign on Twitter at the 8thHealth Education and Training, at the Centre for European Society for Prevention ResearchAdvanced Academic Studies in Dubrovnik. (EUSPR) Conference and Members’ Meeting in Vienna. Hossam’s contribution outlined how he isMore than 40 health professionals from across using Twitter to encourage residents of SaudiCroatia took part in this intensive course over 5 Arabia to seek screening for Type II Diabetes.days. The modular format of the course allowedparticipants to choose the sessions which are According to the Saudi Arabian Ministry of Health,relevant to their needs. The course was organised between 36% and 58% of diabetics in Saudi Arabiaand led by Professor Rawaf from Imperial College (KSA) remain undiagnosed, and diabetes isLondon, and Professor Marijana Bras and prevalent in the population. KSA is also the homeProfessor Velijko Dordevic of University of Zagreb. of more than 40% of active Twitter users in theThe course is planned to repeat on an annual Arab region, which constitutes a total of 2.4basis at the Centre for Advanced Academic million users. For this reason, Twitter seemed aStudies. natural fit for a public health campaign encouraging undiagnosed Saudi Arabians to seek5th International Congress of Person- a Type II Diabetes screening.centred Medicine, Zagreb 23-25 Oct2017 “It takes just one visit to find out your status,” said Dr. Alakhrass. He explained how he is usingAs part of the Congress Prof Rawaf visited Zagreb the Health Belief Model to guide the developmentUniversity and met with Professor Damir Boras, of tweets to send out from the Twitter account hethe Rector, and his deputy Professor Malden will use for the campaign, which is sponsored byJanjanin (a well known musician). the Saudi Arabian National Diabetes Prevention and Control Program.Professor Rawaf delivered two talks on:‘Population dynamic and medical advances The conference in Vienna featured plenaryshaping health agenda and practice’ and on sessions as well as parallel sessions and many‘Evaluation of a national cardiovascular disease posters. Many of the topics emphasized included prevention. One presentation focused on the danger of e-cigarettes, and another looked at
Frugal Innovation in Healthcare delegationopportunities for treating pain with cannabis. evaluation, and bidirectional learningAnother project used the RE-AIM framework to opportunities.evaluate a public health intervention. There was an excellent rapport amongst all theFrugal Innovation in Healthcare delegates and it was discovered that they had amongst them a Karate Master, a concert violinist,In March, the Department hosted a senior a Chess grandmaster and a polymath! Dr Ruvaizdelegation from BRAC (Bangladesh), Integrated Haifa, President of the Sri Lankan MedicalHealth Services (Pakistan), the Sri Lankan Association said, \"The meeting provided a uniqueMedical Association, University of Colombo, and platform to discuss -in detail- a wide range ofthe University of Lincoln, to develop research primary preventive and curative care deliveryprojects and identify funding opportunities in the options with a particular reference to South Asia.area of Frugal Innovation in healthcare. Furthermore the meeting helped crystallize the concept of 'Frugal Innovations' and its impactThe workshop was led by Dr Matthew Harris, Prof from a healthcare delivery perspective on theMala Rao and Dr Yasser Bhatti, with the communities we work in and the 'reversibility' ofparticipation also of Prof Peter Childs (Dyson such innovation to the health system in the UK.”School of Engineering) and Prof James Barlow(Imperial Business School). The delegation spent We are grateful to the Imperial College Londonnearly a week at the Department, and was able to GCRF Community Building Fund for supportingvisit a local GP Practice and the Imperial College this opportunity, and look forward to developingEnterprise Lab during their time in London. They further work with our overseas colleagues overexplored shared interests in areas as diverse as the coming months.developing demonstrator sites for frugalinnovations, intellectual property issues,
Farewell to Professor Elio RiboliHead of the School of Public HealthIn December 2017, Professor Elio Riboli stepped down from his role as Headof the School of Public Health. Professor Riboli became Divisional Head ofEpidemiology, Public Health and Primary Care in 2006 and oversaw theestablishment of the School of Public Health in January 2010.Since taking on leadership 11 years ago Professor Riboli has led thedevelopment of the School in both research and teaching whilst continuallyadvancing and consolidating its high academic reputation, highlighted by theResearch Excellence Framework (REF 2014) which ranked Imperial 1st forworld-leading (4-star) research in Public Health, Health Sciences and PrimaryCare. Professor Elio Riboli has been a very supportive colleague and everyonein the department wishes him the best in his future career.Left to right: Lefkos Middleton, Lyndsey Pallant, Matt Heger, Deborah Ashby, Elio Riboli, NeilFerguson, Azeem Majeed, Helen Ward, Paul Elliot
Programme Lead for Patient and Public Engagement and Involvement What is your role within the department and how long have you been here? I’m the Programme Lead for Patient and Public Engagement and Involvement for the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care (CLAHRC) for Northwest London which is a bit of a mouthful! I joined CLAHRC NWL in February 2009. What does your role involve? I support research improvement teams to involve patients, service users and carers across Northwest London in a range of clinical and community settings. I regularly teach with serviceusers on MSc programmes. I work with research partners at the London School of Hygiene and TropicalMedicine to develop the evidence base for involvement and I mentor Fellows on the NIHR CLAHRC NWLImprovement Leader Programme. I contribute to NIHR activities focused on improving involvementincluding how we understand impact and I review publications for the journal Research Involvement andEngagement and for BMJ Quality and Safety.What do you enjoy most about your role?I really enjoy working with a wide variety of people from all backgrounds especially service users, patientsand carers who are very influential in my personal practice and to our programme. Our team is diversewith different disciplines which I find very beneficial in terms of how we learn and understand challengesin healthcare. I enjoy facilitating, mentoring and teaching as this is a great way to test your ownunderstanding and to keep grounded in the realities of front line care. I like getting out and about to seedifferent organisations across NWL too.Tell us about your favourite achievementEarly on in the CLAHRC NWL programme, we realised we needed to do things to change in how weinteracted with service users, patients and carers. We took the risk to give Open Space Technology a try.This is a technique devised by Harrison Owen to enable people to tackle complex issues by holding anevent around a theme rather than a fixed agenda and it encourages people to self-organise around issuesthat are most important to them. It felt very scary at the time but it proved to be a turning point in howwe approach our work leading to our interest in co-production and the co-design of our ExchangeNetwork with service users, patients, carers, clinicians, researchers and managers. This shows thatinvolvement can be enjoyable and creative and doesn’t have to be about box-ticking.What were you doing prior to this/ what’s your background?My background in nursing. I trained at St Bartholomew’s Hospital in the City and at the HomertonHospital in Hackney. Very different communities and places both of which have changed almost beyondrecognition over the last 20 years. I specialised in cardiothoracic surgical care at the London Chest, John
Radcliffe and Royal Brompton Hospitalswhere I was the Senior Nurse for UserInvolvement before joining NIHRCLAHRC NWL. I completed an MSc inHealth Education and Health Promotionat King’s College London and keep myinterest in public health.Tell us about your outside interestsSpending so much time looking at ascreen, I like to get outside and I enjoywalking including long distances paths.I’d recommend the London Loop andthe Capital Ring which are on ourdoorstep. As an antidote to blue skythinking, I’m a member of the CloudAppreciation Society and you can catchme checking the clouds across theHeathrow flight path from my windowon the 4th Floor of Chelsea andWestminster Hospital.You’re marooned on a desert island –which 3 people (real or fictional, deador alive), 3 tunes and luxury itemwould you choose to be maroonedwith?I’d like to be marooned with StudsTerkel, the American Pulitzer prizewinning oral historian and broadcaster This Exchange Network poster won ‘Best Poster’ at thewho captured the stories of ordinary people. Comedian and Involve21 Conference, November 2017.writer Victoria Wood, whose humour reflects the people andplaces where I grew up in the North West of England. Meera Syal for her versatile talents in acting,singing, drama and comedy. For the music, I’d like Errol Gardner – Penthouse Serenade, jazz for optimism.Perhaps some eighties music for nostalgia. Something like Soft Cell – Tainted Love. I’d also need somecontemporary sounds so First Aid Kit – Emmylou would fit the bill. And for a luxury, a bunch of freshrosemary.
Round up of the latest talks and seminars held at PCPH Dr Paquita de Zulueta – After Grenfell: NHS community outreach - Current challenges and opportunities. A GP's perspective Dr Paquita de Zulueta, a GP who has been volunteering to help survivors in the Westway, gives us her first-hand account of the challenges that arose in the immediate aftermath of the Grenfell tragedy. She discusses issues around community response, psychological first aid and disaster preparedness. The complexities around immigration status even caused reluctance from at least three patients, to go to the hospital. Paquita also discusses what we might learn, as health care professionals, from the way the response was orchestrated. Theopportunities to improve and the long term psychological repercussions for many of the survivors. Watch this presentation Rhiannon Lambert and Sophie Bertrand - Eating disorders from a psychological and nutritional aspect Nutritionists Rhiannon Lambert and Sophie Bertrand discuss the many eating disorders that exist, how they manifest in the patient and what GPs can do to identify, support and treat people who they suspect may have or be developing an eating disorder. Watch this presentation Dr David Salman - The Biology of Being Sedentary: an introduction Sedentary lifestyles are an independent risk factor for: All cause mortality, Atherosclerosis, Several types of cancer including colon and breast, Diabetes, Obesity, Osteoporosis. Increased mortality from sedentary behaviours is only attenuated by high levels of daily physical activity. Dr David Salman discussed the scale of the problem in the UK as well as some of the things we might all do to minimise our sedentary behaviour. Watch this presentationThere are many more fascinating seminars ready for you to view on thePCPH Website (check out the Past Seminar Recordings section)
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