European Health Summit 2013: What is the future for primary care in Europe?" (PDF). Nuffield Trust. 27 January 2013.

If Pritchard does get the job, she will be the first female chief executive of the NHS since its creation in 1948. Stevens, who stands down this month, and his seven predecessors have all been men. Having previously been Chief Executive of University Hospitals Birmingham and Director-General at the Department of Health, he joined KPMG as Global Chairman and Senior Partner for Health in 2009. And so to England and the National Health Service (NHS), which Britnell knows well having spent much of his working life there. He was also treated for prostate cancer at the comparatively young age of 42, so the NHS has special significance for him. Having seen how the absence of healthcare affects the poor in countries like India, South Africa and Brazil, Britnell is a passionate advocate of universal systems like the NHS. He takes a positive view, pointing out that ‘investment in healthcare for all is a value and not just a cost’. It is not just a moral obligation to improve the lives of the individual poor; there are clear social, economic and political benefits too. The NHS has its problems though, and Britnell has specific criticisms familiar to those working in the organisation: in particular, the endless and wasteful initiatives where ‘more energy is spent in producing national policies than ever implementing them’. Image Credit: ( 401(K) 2012)

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From a provider’s perspective, a common three-step process can be found behind many of the world’s most efficient hospital systems. Whether it is India’s ultra-lean chains such as Narayana and Apollo, or world-leading centres of excellence like Geisinger in the US, a common thread shows how high-quality, low-cost care can be achieved. Britnell will continue to serve the UK organisation, focused on clients in the healthcare sector. The leadership of KPMG's Infrastructure service area has already been taken on by UK-based partner Richard Threlfall. One country that has grasped the importance of aged care is Japan, which in 2000 saw the threat that elderly needs posed to its health system and took action. A 1%-2% income tax levy was placed on the over-40s – a bold move considering the sluggish growth and fractious politics of the country. The tax paid for a national aged care service that funds home, community and residential care for all citizens on a means-tested basis. It was a costly decision in the short run, but in the long term has prevented untold admissions to hospital and preserved the health of what is now the world’s oldest population. His early career included various management posts in the NHS, time with the Australian health service, and a year in the civil service fast stream in Melbourne and Sydney before being seconded to the NHS Executive in 1992. Britnell joined St Mary's Hospital in London as a General Manager before being appointed as a Director at Central Middlesex Hospital (now part of North West London Hospitals NHS Trust) in 1995, when he was named Project Director for an Ambulatory Care and Diagnostic (ACAD) Private Finance Initiative (PFI) scheme - the first of its kind in the UK. Now Chairman and Partner of the Global Health Practice at KPMG, and having spent several years travelling the world, working on operations, strategy and policy with governments, public and private sector organisations in 60 countries, Mr Britnell described a vision for the NHS where a more agile approach to workforce planning and education would allow clinicians to be at the forefront of management and supported to be the very best leaders. Healthcare and the life sciences must be part of the UK’s industrial strategy, and there must be greater reciprocity in developing training and education provision for clinicians internationally, according to Mr Britnell, if we are to care adequately for people in the UK and the rest of the world post-Covid.

The Observer, 15 May 2011, "David Cameron's adviser says health reform is a chance to make big profits" However, NHS sources believe that there has been a recent shift in opinion among those making the selection towards appointing 55-year-old Britnell. He became chief executive of University Hospital Birmingham NHS trust at just 34, which is unusually early to take on such a senior role. He then became the NHS’s director-general for commissioning and system management in 2007, when the organisation was still part of the Department of Health.In unguarded comments at a conference in New York organised by the private equity company Apax, Britnell claimed that the next two years in the UK would provide a "big opportunity" for the for-profit sector, and that the NHS would ultimately end up as a financier of care similar to an insurance company rather than a provider of hospitals and staff. I couldn’t agree more. Over the past decade, working in 77 countries, I have come to the regrettable conclusion that no country consistently gets workforce planning right. Yet we are hurtling towards a global crisis. The World Health Organization estimates we will be globally short of 18 million health workers by 2030 – roughly a fifth of the total capacity to care. This fragmentation, Britnell points out, is creating an increasing demand for private health insurance among consumers who are able to afford it, thereby reinforcing existing health inequities. The intersection of health policy and access barriers to essential health services grounded in socioeconomic, geographic and demographic inequities is woven into Britnell’s analysis. In the concluding chapters of the book, he aptly notes “two forces – globalisation and wealth inequality – will create fertile ground for the development of universal healthcare but its successful introduction cannot be taken for granted” (p. 155). With these five dynamics, productivity among clinical staff could improve by 20 percent. We will still need more healthcare staff, but this approach can alleviate the looming crisis while getting patients to the most appropriate care setting.

He went on to run the NHS region from Oxford to the Isle of Wight before joining the NHS Management Board as a Director-General at the Department of Health, where he developed High Quality Care for All with Lord Darzi. He joined KPMG as Global Chairman and Senior Partner for Health for KPMG in the UK in 2009 and has established a successful worldwide health practice. The world faces a deficit of 18 million health workers. Overcoming this will be the single biggest challenge for healthcare over the next 10 years. That’s according to author and KPMG’s global healthcare expert Dr Mark Britnell, who has dedicated his entire professional life to improving healthcare all over the world.I'm a light sleeper and can get by with six hours so I'll usually have a working breakfast with clients, see four to six different organisations in a day, and attend a client dinner most nights. Like everyone, I do my best to eat healthily but this can sometimes be a challenge when I'm on the move so much. Britnell added, “It has been a great honour and pleasure to serve clients around the world. I shall continue as a UK health partner and do occasional global engagements.” Encourage governments to switch from under-supplying health workers to over-production, safe in the knowledge that the jobs are needed. There are various actions that can be taken and Scandinavian countries have made decent progress. At 34 years of age, he became chief executive at University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust, one of the youngest people to be appointed to a chief executive role in the NHS. He also secured the largest PFI single hospital build in England and established the first Royal Centre for Defence Medicine in partnership with the Ministry of Defence.

Mark is the author of In Search of the Perfect Health System, published by Palgrave Macmillian. The book has sold in over 109 countries, including translations into Mandarin, Korean and Portuguese, and was recognised by Chinese Medical Doctors Association as best health book in China in 2017, and in the UK by the British Medical Association, 2016. Mark’s new book, Human: solving the global workforce crisis in healthcare is published by Oxford University Press in March 2019. What types of jobs do you envisage MBA Health graduates pursuing? And do you see a need for these graduates in the sector? Point three, why shouldn’t we get the best talent in the world work in healthcare? Why should it go to financial services or professional services? Healthcare needs the best leaders possible. This course enables clinicians or managers or academics to come into the school and really think about their career prospects and what they want to do for the rest of their lives. A typical week would involve a Sunday afternoon overnight flight from Heathrow followed by work on touch-down. I try to meet KPMG people on Mondays and get over any jet lag! For the rest of the week, I'll be travelling and meeting clients. I'll make presentations and meet ministers, officials and executives throughout the day. Kaigo Hoken refers to the long-term care scheme in Japan, which is expected to improve quality of l (...)Via KPMG he was a member of the World Economic Forum Global Agenda Council on the Future of the Health Sector for four years. [21] He is a Trustee of the King's Fund. [22] He has honorary degrees from Birmingham City University and University of Wolverhampton, and an honorary professorship at Taishan Medical University School in China. [23] He also sits on the advisory board of the China Center for Health Development at Peking University. He was a Trustee of the cancer charity Prostate Cancer UK, having been diagnosed and treated for the disease in 2008. He has often praised the NHS for saving his life. [24] NHS competition and privatisation controversy [ edit ] NHS leaders are keen to ensure that Stevens’s successor continues his habit of speaking out on policy matters, even if that discomforts ministers. The job specification for the chief executive’s post says that candidates should have “the ability to speak truth to power”.