Governance

AYPH’s governance structure is made up of our Board of Trustees, Advisory Council and Youth Advisory Panel.

Trustees

Trustees have overall legal responsibility for AYPH making sure the organisation works to its charitable objectives and conducts all of its work appropriately.

Claire Bethel (Chair)
Claire Bethel is an independent consultant specialising in tackling the impact of violence and abuse. She previously worked in the Department of Health, where she led on policy on young people’s health. She led the National Service Framework for Children, Young People and Maternity Services, and the development of Future In Mind, a comprehensive strategy aimed at improving children and young people’s mental health. She previously worked in the NHS as Chief Executive of a Primary Care Group and helped to set up the Office of the Children’s Commissioner in 2005 where she worked as the first Director of Policy and Research.

Dick Churchill
Dick Churchill is a GP and has previously worked for the University of Nottingham as Director of Clinical Skills for the medical course and contributed to research into mental health and the health care of young people. He is a Fellow of the Royal College of General Practitioners (FRCGP) and has a research doctorate in the field of adolescent healthcare.

Ellen Louise Dowds
Ellen-Louise Dowds is an asthma and allergy paediatric sister in her local community. Ellen-Louise’s background consists of working at Evelina Children’s Hospital, Guys and St Thomas’s NHS Trust, Basildon and Thurrock University Hospital and EPUT. She has had experience guest lecturing at Greenwich University about young people’s health and inpatient treatment, she has also been a peer trainer in the Tree of Life Project for the Children and Young People’s Diabetes Service at University College London Hospitals

Debbie Fallon
Debbie Fallon has a clinical background in both adult and children’s nursing and is a senior lecturer at the University of Manchester. She is also the chair of our Advisory Council Children and of the Young People’s Nurse Academics (CYPNAUK) which is a national organisation of academics involved in the education of children’s nurses at all levels.

Nicola Gray
Nicola Gray is a Senior Lecturer in Pharmacy Practice at the University of Huddersfield. Her research and policy interests include young people’s health, intersectoral working in schools, medicines information and health literacy. She is the Vice President for Europe of the International Association for Adolescent Health, and a Governing Council Member of NCD Child.

Camilla Parker
Dr Camilla Parker is a lawyer and independent consultant specialising in the areas of law and human rights relevant to the mental health care of children, young people and adults.  She has a long-standing interest in promoting a human rights perspective to the development of law, policy and practice in health and social care.

Neal Patel
Neal Patel is the Head of Digital Marketing & Communications at the Royal Pharmaceutical Society. He has a history of working in membership & health care industry, including experience in Media Relations, Stakeholder Engagement, Public Affairs, Public Relations, and Communications Planning.

Darren Sharpe
Darren Sharpe is a Senior Research Fellow and Deputy Director of the Institute for Connected Communities (ICC) based at the University of East London (UEL) and holds a UCL Policy Fellowship with Capabilities in Academic Policy Engagement (CAPE). His expertise includes participatory research with children, young people and vulnerable adults to help interpret, inform and influence policy and practice in public care.

Chris Simpson
AYPH trustee treasurer Chris Simpson is a Chartered Accountant and member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.  He has over thirty years of experience in a variety of areas, including the music industry, Transport for London and latterly the Department of Health and Social Care.

Youth Advisory Panel

The Youth Advisory Panel are responsible for informing AYPH research, governance as well as advising on external research and projects. Young people develop their skills, working alongside AYPH’s participation officers and researchers, as well as engaging with other young people.

The panel directly influence three key areas of AYPH’s work:

• The panel feed directly into AYPH’s work across policy, research and the distribution of health messages across the UK
• The panel influence the priorities of the charity
• The panel are an integral part of AYPH’s commitment to put young people’s voices at the heart of their work

Advisory Council

The Advisory Council support the Board of Trustees in its governance function by discussing and prioritising issues in the young people’s health field from a broad professional perspective. The Advisory Council responds to the needs of the AYPH membership as well as reflecting and responding to the views expressed by other professionals in the field.

Dick Churchill (Chair)
The Advisory Council is chaired by Dick who is also an AYPH trustee.  Other members of our trustee board also attend Advisory Council meetings.

Hannah Baynes
Hannah Baynes is a consultant Paediatrician at Kings College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and is the joint lead for the King’s Adolescent Outreach Service (KAOS).

John Coleman
John Coleman OBE is an AYPH Patron and is currently Visiting Professor at the University of Bedfordshire. 

Gail Dovey-Pearce
Gail Dovey-Pearce is a consultant clinical psychologist: service lead and clinical researcher in paediatric psychology, child health at Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust and an associate researcher at the Institute for Health & Society, Medical School, Newcastle University.

Helena Gleeson
Helena Gleeson is a consultant endocrinologist and Chair of the Royal College of Physicians’ Young Adults and Adolescent Steering Group.

Alison Hadley
Alison Hadley is director of the Teenage Pregnancy Knowledge Exchange at the University of Bedfordshire. She led the Labour Government’s successful 10-year teenage pregnancy strategy and has also worked in the voluntary sector for Brook and is a trained nurse.

Dougal Hargreaves
Dougal Hargreaves is a specialist registrar in general paediatrics at St Mary’s Hospital in London. He is also honorary research associate at the Institute of Child Health at University College London.

Áine Kelly
Áine Kelly is a DPhil student at the Rees Centre for Research in Fostering and Education, based in the University of Oxford’s Department of Education. She is a member of the NICE guidelines development group for the attachment of children in care, children adopted from care, and children at high risk of entering care.

Steph Lamb
Steph Lamb is a GP with a specialist interest in young people’s health and Chair of the Royal College of General Practitioners’ Adolescent Health Group.

Steve Morton
Steve Morton currently leads on health inequalities and healthy place at the Office for Health Improvement and Disparities in the north west region, and was previously the lead for children & young people. Steve also holds a number of management and governance roles in the UK and internationally with the World Organisation of the Scout Movement.

Mudasir Nazir
Mudasir Nazir is an Honorary Academic Fellow in the Department of Brain Sciences at the Imperial College London and a Member of the Royal College of Psychiatry where he leads on Recruitment and Retention for the faculty of Child Psychiatry. He is passionate about early help and early intervention for a partnership approach in child and adolescent mental health

Nicky Pettitt
Nicky Pettitt is a Consultant Nurse for Youth & Transition at University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Trust, she is also a School Governor at Stratford Upon Avon High School.

Gill Turner
Gill Turner is a consultant community paediatrician in Northumberland and a member of the RCPCH Young People’s Health Special Interest Group (YPSHIG).

You can find a copy of our most recent accounts here.