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Main page content Anchor PointDoctor heading to USA
Dimple Vyas and patient Penny Dalton
A consultant anaesthetist from the Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust has been chosen as one of just four UK health professionals to take part in an international initiative which aims to share health knowledge between the UK and the USA.
Dimple Vyas, who has a special interest in chronic pain management, has been offered a prestigious Quality Improvement Fellowship by independent healthcare charity, the Health Foundation. She is the first health professional in the Yorkshire and Humber region to gain the Fellowship.
She will spend a year at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Her focus will be to transform care and drive improvements for patients with long-term conditions, through developing closer working between hospital and community organisations.
On her return to the Calderdale and Huddersfield NHS Foundation Trust, in June 2013, she will put her learning into practice across the Calderdale and Kirklees health community and at a national level.
Dr Vyas said: “The fellowship is a unique opportunity for me to work alongside leading experts from around the world and look at new ways of working.”
Dr Vyas has led two successful initiatives funded by the Health Foundation, called Co-creating Health (CCH). Since the programme was launched in 2007, hundreds of people across Kirklees and Calderdale living with chronic pain and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have had their lives transformed through developing the knowledge, skills and confidence to manage their condition.
Dorothy Flatman, Programme Manager at the Health Foundation, said: “In recent years there has been increasing interest in the Co-creating Health programme and its achievements. With the changing health landscape, the focus on the benefits of self management support has greatly increased.
“The Fellowship programme will help to create a group of key leaders to drive service improvements and make real changes to the quality of healthcare.”