What 3 words would you use to sum yourself up, Peter?
Sleep, childcare, and work!
Who is your favourite media personality? Who was your hero/heroine growing up?
Growing up, I mainly followed fictional characters like Optimus Prime and Spider Man, and now I would say Garry Oldman (from Slow Horses).
What one thing can we all do to improve our mental health?
I think it’s very important and valuable to give yourself some space, and find time to make, learn and create new things.
If a Genie grants you only one wish, what would you wish for?
I would wish for a very smooth and relaxed Christmas with all my extended family members… immediately followed by world peace!
What does a Chief Clinical Information Officer do? What does success look like for you?
I have been a doctor for quite a long time, working in different services, gaining lots of experience with service users and staff. I think that’s how you start to appreciate what good, compassionate care looks like. So, I’m bringing that mindfulness of people’s needs to technology. We are trying to ensure that we are making choices according to the needs of the service users. I use my clinical experience to help the digital team and the wider service to move things in the right direction for better care. I attend a lot of meetings on a day-to-day basis, bringing in new technology that works better for patients and staff, connecting with people to understand their needs and working on problems. Another part of my role is training, educating and up-skilling staff in inclusion work. I also work in clinical safety assurance.
Can you give an example of how technology revolutionises healthcare?
I think technology revolutionises healthcare by having technical solutions for what used to live on sheets of paper or on shelves. When all the information is at your fingertips, it saves lots of time and effort, and information can be accessed anywhere, at any time. The care is provided effectively with a full picture of the information. We are not only digitising our own system, but also sharing it across the organisation, and with local partner organisations, so everyone is fully informed about care and treatment plans for service users. Service users have the ownership and control of their own health records and treatment.
Can you highlight some of the difficulties you overcome when learning about the digital world?
I’ve been lucky in that I’ve always had a bit of technology around me growing up with computers, so it wasn’t overwhelming for me when it became more complex and modern. In my current job there is a lot of complicated technology which can be difficult to understand, but once again I am lucky to have support from my colleagues to help me learn. I think there’s always something that we don’t know or don’t understand - the nature of technology is there is always something new coming along and so you have to keep learning new things all the time. The reason I got into this is because I like technology and learning new things. I enjoy the challenge.
As a doctor your career and role will be full of pressure, how do you lookafter your mental health?
The main thing I’m doing for my mental health now is trying to have more definite separation between work and life. I’m trying not to feel guilty about it, which can be tricky sometimes. It’s a combination of recognising this and trying to see the value of what you’ve done. You can’t always win, achieve, and get it right first time, so if you have tried your best every day, even if it wasn’t necessarily productive or effective, then that’s okay! It’s very important to be kind to yourself.
What are your hopes for the PPDC, what would you like to see the PPDC achieve?
I’m very enthusiastic about two things that we are working towards now. There are two arms of the People Participation Digital Strategy. One is to do with inclusion – inclusion for service users and for staff as well. Helping people to feel able to use technology in their lives on a day-to-day basis, like paying bills, accessing job opportunities, making online appointments, consultations etc. Empowering people with the knowledge, experience, and confidence in a digital world - the People Participation Digital Community is the most effective way to do that. The other arm is the co-production side of things, and for that we need to understand people’s need and design things with the people who are going to be using the technology. Co-design/co-production needs to be totally central to what the Digital Team do, and we need to make sure we are reaching and connecting with people to understand what they want, so we can deliver better.