GOSH’s International and Commercial signs deal at Arab Health exhibition
PPU Watch
Compiled by Philip Housden
Signing the deal were: Christopher Rockenbach, director of International and Commercial at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children, and Ashish Koshy, group chief operating officer at M42. The agreement was signed in the presence of Prof Sir Stephen Powis, National Medical Director at NHS England; Aphrodite Spanou, director of healthcare at the UK Department for Business and Trade; Gareth Johnson MP, UK Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy for UAE; James Sibley, chief finance officer at M42; Omar Al Naqbi, acting executive director at Danat Al Emarat Hospital for Women and Children.
Several NHS trust private patients and commercial teams attended Arab Health, the region’s health trade fair.
Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children (GOSH) signed an innovative three-year deal at the event for the Middle East with M42, a global tech-enabled health company.
GOSH and M42 will partner to introduce an innovative education initiative to enhance paediatric critical and complex care in the region, with an initial focus on M42’s Danat Al Emarat Hospital for Women and Children, a pioneer in paediatric health in the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
The agreement ceremony, at the M42 stand during Arab Health, was signed by Ashish Koshy, group chief operating Officer of M42, and Christopher Rockenbach, managing director of international and commercial, Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Foundation Trust.
Mr Rockenbach said: ‘We are proud of our long-standing relationship with the UAE and excited to be strengthening our commitment to the region with such an esteemed partner as M42.
‘We look forward to contributing to improving children’s health through this collaboration.’
Leeds considers private operator partnership
Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust (LTHT) is considering options to enable the successful development and delivery of its private patient business.
It is one of the largest and busiest acute hospital trusts in the UK with a budget of over £1.4bn and employing more than 21,000 staff.
Last year, it treated more than 1.7m patients from two main sites: Leeds General Infirmary (LGI), including the Leeds Children’s Hospital and Leeds Dental Institute, and St James’s University Hospital – including Leeds Cancer Centre.
The trust reported private patient income of less than 0.1% of total trust incomes in 2022-23. This was only £1.4m, down £2.4m and 63% on the prior year. However, pre-Covid private patient revenues reached £5.5m in 2019-20.
LTHT has invited expressions of interest from UK and international private hospital groups interested in collaborating with it to jointly progress a successful long-term private patient business across specific or all LTHT’s clinical specialties and sites.
The trust’s objectives are stated as:
Enhancing its private patient offering to give patients the opportunity to receive private healthcare on an LTHT site;
Support LTHT clinical teams who provide private healthcare to do so on an LTHT site;
To create an income generation source which will allow money to be re-invested in NHS staff, care and services.
Exploratory meetings are due this month (March).
Philip Housden (right) is director of Housden Group commercial healthcare consultancy
- See ‘London PPUs combine’