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Nasir Hamid
The UK’s General Medical Council has appointed Professor Anthony Harnden as one of two new registrant members to its governing body from 1 January 2017.
The GMC’s Council ensures the GMC is properly managed and fulfils its objectives to protect, promote and maintain the health and safety of the public by ensuring proper standards in the practice of medicine. The GMC is responsible for the regulation of all UK medical schools and postgraduate training.
Professor Harnden is Professor of Primary Care in Oxford University’s Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences a Governing Body Fellow of St Hugh’s College.
He is joined by Professor Paul Knight, a consultant physician in geriatric medicine at Glasgow Royal Infirmary, and two new lay members. They will each serve a four year term until December 2020.
Professor Harnden said: ”It will be a great honour and privilege to serve as a member of the GMC Council. I intend to provide a strong primary care perspective to all discussions and decision making processes.”
Professor Terence Stephenson, GMC Chair welcomed the new members to the GMC Council and said: “Their wealth of experience will make sure that the decisions that we take as an independent body will continue to be rooted in the everyday experiences of doctors.”
Alongside his clinical research in primary care paediatrics, Professor Harnden is a general practitioner and has worked as a Principal in General Practice at Morland House Surgery, Wheatley Oxfordshire for 26 years.
He is currently a Deputy Chairman of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) and Chairman of the Adolescent sub-committee. He is a specialist member of NICE Quality Standards Advisory Committee for Immunisation uptake in the under 19s. He developed and is adviser for the British Medical Journal diagnostic series ‘Easily Missed?’
He was formerly the National Clinical Champion for Child Health at the Royal College of General Practitioners. He was the primary care lead for the Confidential Enquiry in Child Deaths and a Board Trustee at the Centre for Maternal and Child Enquiries. During the last pandemic he was a member of the Department of Health Pandemic Influenza Operational Advisory Group.
The appointments follow an open recruitment process overseen by a panel of independent members.