X
!

Registration for the 2012 WHCN conference is now open.

Keynote Speakers

Home  /  Keynote Speakers

AGPN, as host of the 2012 Conference, has been working with an international advisory committee in identifying high-calibre keynote speakers for this year's event. As the biographies illustrate below, the speaker's are international leaders and innovators in their respective fields, bringing with them a wealth of knowledge and experience in health care network development, utilisation and effectiveness for the benefit of global population health.

 
Additional speaker biographies will be added as they are confirmed.  
 
Professor Jan De Maeseneer (Belgium)
 
Professor Jan De Maeseneer is the current Chair of the European Forum for Primary Care, the Secretary General of the Network: Towards Unity for Health (TUFH), Head of the Department of Family Medicine and Primary Health Care, Ghent University, Belgium (a WHO Primary Health Care Collaborating Centre), and Promoter of the Primafamed Network for the optimisation of family medicine training in eastern and southern Africa.
 
A qualified General Practitioner, he has been working part-time as a family physician in a community health centre in the city of Ghent since 1978. Receiving his PhD in 1989, Jan has gone on to receive the "WONCA-award for excellence in health care: the Five-Star Doctor", and a "Doctor Honoris Causa" degree at the Universidad Mayor de San Simon in Cochabamba (Bolivia). He is the author of more than 120 scientific publications, eighty of which have been published in international journals with the peer review-system. From 2006 to 2008, Prof. De Maeseneer was a member of the Knowledge Network on "Health Systems" for the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) Commission on the Social Determinants of Health, and is a member of the Scientific Committee for the Renewal of Primary Health Care at the WHO, Geneva.
 
See interview's with Jan here.
 
Dr Brian Evoy (Canada)
 
Dr Brian Evoy leads the Divisions of Family Practice initiative in British Columbia Canada.  He has more than 15 years’ experience in health care and health service delivery.  A key area of specialty has been community, partner and physician engagement to build regional, local and provincial strategies and programs.  Through well-designed consultation processes, Brian enables and facilitates partnerships with a range of organizations and objectives.  Network theory, community development, collaboration and consensus building factor heavily in his approach. 
 
Brian’s clinical experience as a social worker includes work with various community and youth services organisations in Vancouver and Ottawa.  He holds a Bachelor and Masters in Social Work and a Doctor of Philosophy focused on ethical decision-making.
 
Professor Helen Keleher (Australia)
 
Professor Helen Keleher is a public health social scientist who is Head of the Department of Health Social Science, School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University. She is the Current President of the Public Health Association of Australia and holds a Joint Chair in Health Equity with Inner South Community Health Service. 
 
Her research interests are in primary and community health, the social determinants of health and inequity, building capacity for public health, population health and health promotion in health services/systems and policy, and women's health. Helen's first career was in nursing and her PhD topic was a social history of public health nursing in Australia.
 
Helen is course convenor of the Honours degree of Bachelor of Health Science.  She is editor and author of several books on the determinants of health, health promotion and health systems, and dozens of journal articles and book chapters. From 1998-2005 she was National Convenor of the Australian Women's Health Network and was convenor of the 4th and 5th Australian Women's Health Conferences in 2001 and 2005. From 2005-8 she was a member of the Women and Gender Equity Knowledge Network of the Commission on the Social Determinants of Health.
 
Dr Judith Smith (UK)
 
Dr Judith Smith is an experienced and widely published health services researcher and policy analyst.  Before joining the Nuffield Trust in February 2009, she spent 14 years working at the Health Services Management Centre, University of Birmingham where she was Senior Lecturer and Director of Research, and Academic Director of the NHS Management Training Scheme.  Prior to that, she spent eight years as a senior manager in the NHS.
 
At the Nuffield Trust, she leads a team whose research focuses on the development and effectiveness of commissioning in the NHS, the quest for better integrated care, the role and potential of physician organisations, and the search for health system efficiency in the economic downturn.
 
See interviews with Judith here.
 
Professor Philip Davies (Australia)
 
Philip Davies was appointed as Professor of Health Systems and Policy in the School of Population Health at the University of Queensland in 2009.  Prior to taking up his current position he worked for 6½ years as a Deputy Secretary in the Australian (Federal) Government Department of Health and Ageing where he was responsible for several key areas of health policy and financing as well as corporate management of the Department.
 
Professor Davies has undertaken numerous consultancy assignments for AusAID and the World Health Organisation in areas such as human resources for health and development of national health plans.
 
In a health sector career spanning more than 30 years Professor Davies has also been a Deputy Director-General in the New Zealand Ministry of Health, a Senior Health Economist with the World Health Organization in Geneva and spent 14 years as a specialist health care management consultant with Coopers & Lybrand (now PricewaterhouseCoopers) in the UK and New Zealand.  He became a Partner in the New Zealand firm in 1995.
 
Professor Davies holds a first-class honours degree in Mathematics, a masters in Management Science & Operational Research and is a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
 
Dr Jason Cheah (Singapore)
 
Dr Cheah is current CEO of the National Agency for Integrated Care (AIC), Singapore. He possesses a medical degree from the National University of Singapore which he received in 1991. After completing the requisite clinical training and residency postings in general internal medicine, Dr Cheah was offered a scholarship and traineeship in Public Health Medicine. He successfully completed that training in 1998 and obtained his Masters of Medicine in Public Health (with Distinction) from the same University. He concurrently also completed his Masters in Health Care Management from Wales University (Swansea) and a MBA from Warwick University. In 2001, he was awarded the Fellowship of the Academy of Medicine (FAM) of Singapore.
 
Dr Cheah worked previously in the Ministry of Health Singapore for 8 years, dealing with a variety of health policy and planning, health regulation and accreditation issues, and spent a number of years working in senior management roles in the private acute care sector. He remains active in teaching in the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health in the Faculty of Medicine in the Yong Loo Lin (YLL) School of Medicine, National University of Singapore. He also teaches post-graduate and advanced diploma students in the Nanyang Polytechnic School of Health Sciences and the Ngee Ann Polytechnic School of Nursing. He has published widely in numerous local and international peer reviewed journals on a variety of topics ranging from casemix management to clinical pathways, case management, chronic disease management, integrated care and health services research.
 
Dr Johhny Marshall (UK)
 
Dr Marshall has been a GP in Buckinghamshire since 1992. Having previously served as Treasurer to National Association of Primary Care, Johnny served as Chairman from September 2008 to December 2011.  His practice was a first wave PMS pilot and works in ever closer collaboration with two other practices as the Westongrove PMS Partnership.  Johnny has undertaken various roles within the NHS Buckinghamshire and is currently chair of United Commissioning, one of the Buckinghamshire pathfinder Clinical Commissioning Groups.
 
Ms Fiona Thomson (New Zealand)
 
Information to be added
 
Dr Emil Djakic (Australia)
 
Dr Djakic is current Chair of the Australian General Practice Network, and a general practitioner working in the north west region of Tasmania. A graduate of the University of Tasmania, Emil has shown his commitment to general practice over the past ten years, working as a full-time GP, practice principal and owner. At the state level, he has served on the Board of the Tasmian General Practice Divisions for three years and was the Board representative on the Information Technology/Information Management Systems Sub-Committee. 
 
Dr Bev O'Keefe (New Zealand)
 
Dr Bev O'Keefe was a partner in a three-doctor urban general practice in Rotorua from 1980 until 2009. This was interspersed with a year in general practice in rural British Columbia, Canada in 1987-88.
 
During her time in Rotorua she was very active in local general practice organisational activity and was chair of the Rotorua General Practice Group IPA from 2001 to 2004. She was responsible for founding multidisciplinary general practice clinics within local secondary schools, some of the first such clinics in New Zealand. 
 
Mr Mark Boutros (US)
 
Mark Boutros is a social strategy globalist with an academic background in public health, international affairs and education. Mark is an expert on communicating issues related to health promotion and disease prevention. He brings his scientific training, research methodologies, and international perspective to the private sector providing strategic and content guidance to organizations and companies. His expertise in behavior change communication and corporate responsibility programs helps companies translate their pro-social initiatives into memorable and successful campaigns. Mark’s extensive international contacts within the public, private and non-governmental sectors allow him to form creative and lasting partnerships that help brands build platforms that leverage their content strategies and assets competitively and productively.

Most recently, Mark worked with Interbrand to help them establish their global Corporate Citizenship practice. At Interbrand, Mark worked with major global corporations in defining and developing their pro-social and environmental business and branding strategies. Before Interbrand, Mark consulted with the Gates Foundation and PATH assisting them to build a knowledge framework for malaria prevention in sub-Saharan Africa. His work helped establish a communication network among public health practitioners within national Ministries of Health across the continent

Ms Feyi Akindoyeni – Conference Facilitator – Kreab Gavin Anderson (Australia)
 
Feyi has over 15 years experience as a leading corporate strategist with expertise in public affairs, market and social research, and marketing strategy specialising in the health, education, IT and social media sectors. Over the last three years as head of Kreab Gavin Anderson’s Canberra office, Feyi has worked closely with some of the most senior Ministers in the Federal Cabinet and is highly regarded at the adviser level.

Since joining Kreab Gavin Anderson in 2006, Feyi has worked with clients including, the Commonwealth Department  of Health & Ageing, Australian General Practice Network, St Lukes Care, Aged and Community Services Australia, the Pharmacy Guild, Medicines Australia, Google and Apple.  

Prior to joining KGA, Feyi worked as an external consultant on milestone campaigns for Australian Federation of AIDS Organisations (AFAO) and ACON, NSW Department of Health, Commonwealth, NSW and Victorian Education Departments and a number of major universities.