Healthcare | Howard Lyons
Britain to help bring about lasting partnerships.
Maximising the NHS brand “The NHS brand is very powerful
and it has the potential to bring a lot of advantage to the UK,” says Lyons. “We have many doctors and nurses from overseas and we can use their knowledge and expertise to link up with healthcare providers overseas to the mutual benefit of everyone. It’s estimated that about a third of NHS employees either come from overseas or were trained overseas and they have these links which we are uncovering every day. “There is a balance between
private patients coming here from overseas and the improvement of hospitals in those countries, so that they do not need to come to the UK,” he continues. “ For example there is a Moorfields Hospital in Dubai, so that instead of patients coming from the Middle East to
HOWARD LYONS
l Howard has over 30 years’ experience of public and private sector healthcare throughout the UK and in more than 65 countries worldwide, advising on health services management and strategic health sector reform.
He spent the first ten years of his career working in the NHS as a senior manager in London Teaching Hospitals. Since leaving the NHS to work in international healthcare with major British companies, he has managed large hospitals in the Middle East and undertaken a wide range of consulting assignments for public and private sector clients as well as for some of the leading development agencies such as the World Bank, Department for International Development, Inter-American Development Bank and the United Nations. Howard has worked extensively
throughout the Middle East and spent two years living in Dubai acting as an advisor to the government on health sector reform. Howard has more recently been working in Barbados undertaking an Institutional Assessment and Expenditure Review of the health system and also in Pakistan where he led the team responsible for establishing the Healthcare Commission in Punjab to regulate the quality of healthcare.
London for eye treatment they can go to their own Moorfields. ‘We spend £120 billion on the NHS each year, and we should be getting a return on that in some way. The private patients in the NHS who come from overseas generate income. We are looking at how can we build on that and make a much more significant contribution to that £120 billion through our international capabilities and exporting our expertise.” Budget pressures are a key concern for the NHS and through Heathcare UK these pressures should be relieved. ‘NHS Hospitals now have the freedom to earn 49 per cent of income from private patients which used to be only 6 per cent” he says. “But now we are consciously cultivating NHS organisations and inviting them to come on missions to see how partnerships will benefit them.” Over the past year, Healthcare UK has established itself as the bridge between British healthcare organisations, governments and providers around the world who are planning significant healthcare developments. Healthcare UK has supported 24 major events across the world and UK organisations have signed contracts to collaborate internationally
‘We have launched in our four target markets which are China, India, Middle East and Brazil, and have had ministerial visits to all those countries either as part of the launch follow up to the launch. Both the Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy Kenneth Clarke and Secretary of State Jeremy Hunt have signed memoranda of understanding at national and provincial levels in these key areas,” says Howard Lyons.
China Opportunities
Heathcare UK has identified four areas to focus on initially - care of the elderly, training and education, hospital and management infrastructure and digital health. So far it has had round table discussions with British companies who will then meet with their Chinese counterparts to talk further.
“China is a very unusual case because the need is very much for primary care,” says Lyons who first went to China in 1978. “Currently it is the hospitals that bear the
global-opportunity.co.uk
‘Through Healthcare UK, overseas clients can access the significant benefits of that investment and acquire the know-how to extend their own healthcare provision.’
brunt of it, but doctors don’t get paid very well, with some of their income coming from commission on the drugs patients buy. There is still a big discrepancy between rural and urban healthcare. Rural areas are still dependant on traditional Chinese medicine remedies because the western style health care is fairly negligible, so China could benefit from our experiences of delivering primary care. “Similarly elderly care in China is also a big issue that the government faces,” he continues. “I think care of the elderly is a big opportunity and a big challenge for British companies and it is something that we want to encourage more British organisations to get involved in. “In 10 years’ time I would like all hospitals in the NHS to be involved overseas in a commercial or philanthropic way, or probably both. There is a growth agenda in the Cabinet and we have got to bring a return on the amount of money we spend on the health service in the UK. Our first and foremost priority is winning business. “My target is £1.5bn over three years so that will always be our focus, but on the whole we are not driven by financial rewards. We are essentially trying to get a return on the investment in the NHS over the past 65 years in overcoming the challenges that we faced in healthcare delivery to help other countries around the world.”
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FURTHER INFORMATION
www.gov.uk/healthcareuk
ISSUE 01 | GLOBAL OPPORTUNITY 2014 157
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