Professor Dame Robina Shah recognised in New Year’s Honours

30 January 2023

Professor Dame Robina Shah, an NCA Non-Executive Director, Professor of Medical Education and Psychosocial Medicine as well as Director of The Doubleday Centre for Patient Experience at the University of Manchester has been awarded the title of Dame of the British Empire (DBE). She is considered as one of the country’s leading experts in patient care based on a track record of achievement including the international recommendations she helped develop for the World Health Organisation (WHO), which were adopted as a set of standards for the UK. Robina-Shah-4.jpg

Professor Shah said:

“I feel extremely honoured to have received this accolade. The announcement came at a very difficult time for me as I had just lost my mother. You know it's kind of a bittersweet thing. I become very emotional when I'm talking about it just because I still want to ring my mum and tell her.

It has taken decades of working with patients, service users, families and colleagues and I genuinely believe when you are offered or given recognition in this way, it's never about the individual, it’s not about me, it's about the team you work with and the family, friends and colleagues who support you to make a difference to the community we serve.”

In 2011, the PM appointed her to the NHS Futures Forum which developed the revised NHS Constitution and the “NHS’s role in the public’s health”. 

She informed recommendations for the 2014 Care Act and 2015 Children and Families Act.

She established the first national patients’ safety ambassadors training programme for NHS Trust Boards and her work is cited in the 2015 joint Medical Schools Council and General Medical Council Report “First Do No Harm”.

In 2015, she co-authored Tackling Disability Hate Crime and Disability Discrimination. Her recommendations became the basis of the 2016 Government strategic action plan on hate crime, requiring full implementation by local government, the police and NHS.

She established the first ever UK medical school’s patient partnership collaboration, a network open to over 40 medical schools, dedicated to patient centred education.

Professor Shah joined the NCA in September 2022.

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