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Workshop: How to develop a portfolio career

Meet the Speakers

Dr Rizwan Malik 

Dr Rizwan Malik is a leading radiologist with an interest in health tech, digital imaging, and the potential of AI to support clinicians and patients.  

Rizwan studied medicine in Cambridge and London before qualifying as a radiologist. He joined what is now Bolton NHS Foundation Trust in 2006 and has held a number of increasingly senior roles at the organisation, where he became divisional medical director in 2020.  

Alongside his career in radiology, he has been a clinical advisor to leading imaging suppliers, and is managing director of South Manchester Radiology, a consultancy that advises the NHS and vendors on transformation and innovation, with a focus on imaging and AI.  

He is the immediate Past-President of UKIO – the largest Imaging and Oncology conference in the UKIO – where he works to diversify the range of presentations and engage the supplier community in shared learning activities. 

Rizwan says his priority is to see healthcare make similar gains in the future. “Both the healthcare system and its suppliers need to be asking: how can we go further?” he says. 

Prof Joe McDonald 

Professor Joe McDonald, consultant psychiatrist, CCIO and professor of Health Informatics Practice and former NHS Trust Medical Director, led the successful digitisation of NHS Mental Health services during the National Programme for IT as National Clinical Lead.  

 He is the founder member and six times elected chairman of the Digital Health National CCIO network and founding director of The Great North Care Record. He is currently principal consultant at Ethical Healthcare CIC, Medical Director at Parsek Solutions, Sleepstation and SARD JV limited.  

 He is a widely read columnist at Digital Health and UX and large interorganisational health IT project specialist. Joe has carried out 5 National EPR usability surveys over the last 10 years and can be found on Twitter.

Prof Sam Shah 

Professor Sam Shah is Chief Medical Strategy Officer for Numan, the online men's health provider. Sam’s interests span digital health, clinical leadership and public health. Sam has a strong interest in consumer facing digital health services.  

He is a digital health technology advisor to a number of healthcare and technology companies, spanning a range of industries including telecommunications, assessment of apps, scaling new technology into the NHS and workforce solutions. Sam was previously National Director of Digital Development for NHS England and NHSX, where he was responsible for digital development of the ecosystem and leading on a number of national transformation programmes.  

Sam has been involved in digital and clinical policy, working with regulators and addressing reimbursement models. He has worked closely with organisations involved in assessing digital health services in the UK and Europe. Sam advises Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust on digital transformation and innovation adoption across medical technology and continues to work in primary healthcare. His academic interests involve teaching and education across digital health and entrepreneurship working with Ulster University, University of Central Lancashire and UCL Global Business School for Health.

Twitter handle: @healthyopinion. LinkedIn: sam-shah-nhs.

Prof Shafi Ahmed

Professor Shafi Ahmed is a multi-award-winning surgeon, humanitarian, teacher, futurist, innovator and entrepreneur.  

After studying medicine at Kings College Hospital Medical School London, he completed his surgical training in London. He is currently a Laparoscopic Colorectal surgeon specialising in colorectal cancer at The Royal London and St Bartholomew’s Hospitals. 

He is a 3x TEDx and an international keynote speaker and delivered over 300 keynotes in 40 countries. He is the CEO of Medical Realities an XR education company. He co-founded the GIANT health summit in London bringing together a community of 200 000 digital health innovators/entrepreneurs. He is one of the top 20 global influencers in digital health and innovation and was a HIMSS Future50 clinical leader in 2020. He won the Silver Scalpel Award as the best national surgical trainer in the UK in 2015. In 2017 he was the top British Asian star in Tech. In 2018 he was awarded the Future NHS award for NHS70 by members of parliament. He is a humanitarian and has worked in many countries including war zones and was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2020 for his humanitarian work and global surgical education. 

Dr Sarim Ather

Dr Ather is a Consultant Radiologist and Radiology AI Lead at Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. He has completed a PhD in neuroimaging and has a keen interest in the application of digital technologies in health care. At Oxford, Dr Ather works with a multidisciplinary group including data scientists and computer vision experts to develop and validate radiology artificial intelligence algorithms in a range of disease areas from arthritis to lung cancer.  

He is leading the roll-out of the NHS AI deployment platform in the Thames Valley Imaging Network and will be evaluating the real-world performance of AI algorithms as part of the programme. Dr Ather also led the development of www.raiqc.com a web-based platform for radiology education and research which has now been spun-out as a company and has raised over £2m in funding. 

Dr Amrita Kumar 

Dr Kumar has been recently named 2022 Top 50 Innovator & Top 50 Influential Woman in the UK for leading innovation in the use of AI within the NHS.  

She was appointed as a substantive Consultant Radiologist at Frimley Health in 2013 with a subspecialist interest in breast cancer screening. She has a keen interest in Artificial Intelligence and has set up trust wide research collaboration to implement a digital enabled AI infrastructure, as well as implement novel AI software for improved detection of breast and lung cancer.  

Ultimately, her aim is to have a positive social impact on cancer screening within the NHS integrated with AI, working in conjunction with various stakeholders with a mission statement of patient and value-focused healthcare. She has also been appointed Chair at the British Institute of Radiology National Clinical Intelligence & Informatics Committee to look at the national integration and implementation of AI into clinical practice. 

With thanks to all the health industry sponsors and Mazars, providing audit, tax, and financial advisory services in Manchester.