A bit of nice news before Xmas - after one of the longest application processes I have been involved in, I received confirmation that I have been accepted as a Non Executive Director of a Primary Care Trust (PCT). Ever since I started at A4e, I have retained a keen interest in the development of the health service ad it has been a long term ambition to work in this area. It is great to be able to combine this with my work at A4e.

 
My passion for trying to add value in the development of health services in the UK started when I met an NHS CEO 12 years ago. I was fascinated by the challenges he talked about as we did our MBA together. It was around then that I decided it was an area I would like to contribute to as my career developed. So, 12 years on I am looking forward to tackling the issues which PCTs are tasked with addressing.

 
The newspapers today had a lot of column inches devoted to the NHS and the challenge of inner city 'health' and the health of the nation. The NHS is often criticised when these issues are raised but increasingly we need to look at our own individual and community responsibilities to prevent ill health in our neighbourhoods. There is some fantastic work going in across voluntary and community groups in this field of work and I am keen to find out more about it as I start my work on the PCT.

As ever, with health, as with many areas of public service delivery, my belief is that services will be improved through collaboration between the public, private and voluntary sector. It is never a question of one sector or the other but how we integrate services to the best interests of our customers - everybody using public funded health services. It's going to be an interesting challenge and one I am really looking forward to in the New Year.

Have views on your PCT or what PCT's ought to make their priority? Let me know - as a non exec director maybe I can take some of your ideas and issues forward.