IBMS Congress 2025

Chris Sleight

Chief Officer, Greater Manchester Diagnostic Network

No bio provided

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Alan Deacon

National Pathology Programme Lead, NHS Wales Executive

Alan Deacon is the National Pathology Programme Lead working as part of the NHS Wales Performance and Improvement. With a background as a Biomedical Scientist in Cellular Pathology, he is a Fellow of the Institute of Biomedical Science and has been a Chartered Scientist with The Science Council since 2004. He is currently a National Council Member of the Institute of Biomedical Science as well as a member of several industry National and European Pathology Advisory Boards. His career spans over 35 years, during which he has worked in both public and private healthcare sectors, always with a focus on improving Pathology services.

In recent years, Alan has held several senior leadership roles in the NHS, where he has been involved in service redesign and organisational collaboration as well as introduction of novel technologies and working practices. Since moving to Wales in 2022, his efforts have been centred on applying systemic leadership to effect positive change both within Pathology services and also the wider health system.

Through the National Programme, Alan has worked hard to promote better understanding of Pathology services and the critical role they play in patient pathways across the healthcare ecosystem. Alan lives with his family in North Wales and outside of work enjoys endurance (ultra) running, collecting vinyl records, appreciating Scottish malt whisky and getting to grips with learning to speak Italian, the latter of which represents a renaissance in language learning following a dark age stretching back to O levels and the mid 1980’s!

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Helen Gordon

President of Council, University of Reading

No bio provided

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Robert Simpson CSci, FIBMS, FRSM, MAIMS, FBCS, LFEDIP

Interim Network Director, ME-5 Pathology Network

Robert is the Institute’s clinical informatics lead and IT Specialist Advisor, he represents the IBMS on the NHSE Pathology Standards Governance Board and other professional informatics forums. He has worked as a biomedical scientist for many years, initially specialising in clinical chemistry. He has held leadership and management roles in several UK hospitals and is currently interim network director of the ME-5 Pathology Network in the East of England. He has a long-term interest in the use of IT and clinical informatics by pathology and for patient benefit.

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Simon Brewer

Managing Director, South West London Pathology

No bio provided

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