ROB DEMARTINO
CAPTAIN
BRITISH AIRWAYS
Having flown professionally for nearly 40 years, Rob is currently a senior training captain at British Airways on the Airbus A380/A350 and a senior examiner on behalf of the Civil Aviation Authority. He previously held these roles on the Boeing B747 and Boeing B737.
His role has included development of Instructor training programmes, developing European legislation for the introduction of Evidence Based Training across EASA and ensuring that Instructors, Examiners and Pilots meet and maintain the standards set by the Regulator.
Rob teaches and assesses human factors skills, trains instructors in crew resource management and is passionate about facilitating excellence in the application of human factors.
Peter Brennan is a Consultant Surgeon with an interest in head and neck cancer and reconstruction, working in Portsmouth, UK. He has a personal chair in Surgery in recognition of his extensive research and education profile. To date he has published over 580 papers including more than 60 on human factors (HF) and patient safety. He is editor of 5 major surgical textbooks including the forthcoming and much anticipated Gray’s Surgical Anatomy (due to be published in November 2019) which begins with a chapter on minimising error in the operating theatre.
Peter is recent past Chairman of the MRCS Committee (the exam required to enter higher specialty training in surgery in the UK and Ireland) and is the current research lead for MRCS, driving up quality assurance for this important examination.
His extensive HF work, collaborating with airline pilots, National Air Traffic Services (NATS) and more recently the Red Arrows, has resulted in many changes to theatre practice, better team working, reducing hierarchy and improvements in patient safety across medical specialties, as well as changing the MRCS delivery nationally.
Peter has recently been awarded a PhD entitled ‘Applying HF to Improve Patient Safety’ – likely to be the first of its kind in healthcare. His profile and reputation as an engaging and entertaining speaker and trainer leads to many invites from local to international level, and he works with national organisations including the Royal Colleges and GMC In helping to reduce medical error.
PETER BRENNAN
MD, PhD FRCS (Eng), FRCSI,
Hon FRCS (Glasg), FFST RCS (Ed)
CONSULTANT
ORAL & MAXILLOFACIAL SURGEON
MARK PONNUSAMY
SENIOR FIRST OFFICER
BRITISH AIRWAYS
Mark began a career in Investment Banking before following his passion for commercial aviation. With 14 years' professional experience on Airbus and Boeing aircraft, Mark currently combines flying with his role as a trainer/examiner on the Airbus A380/A350 and has operated a royal flight on behalf of British Airways.
Within British Airways he is responsible for designing and delivering examination and training packages which ensure regulatory compliance, enhanced flight safety and optimised crew resource management. He is currently part of a working group which is introducing Evidenced Based Training into the airline which represents a ‘new training paradigm’ for pilot HF training.
Francis is a Consultant Transplant Surgeon at Guy’s and St Thomas’, King’s College and Great Ormond Street Hospitals. He has particular interests in living donation, paediatric transplantation and vascular access.
He has had a long term commitment to medical education, having contributed to the MRCS curriculum, development of the Care of the Critically Ill Surgical Patient programme and is a faculty member for the Non-Technical Skills for Surgeons course.
He is a keen advocate for human factors and non-technical skills in healthcare and is a Consultant in Human Factors training to the Simulation and Interactive Learning centre (SAiL) at GSTT / King’s College, University of London.
FRANCIS CALDER
FRCS (Eng)
CONSULTANT
RENAL & TRANSPLANT SURGEON
DAVID THOMAS
CAPTAIN
BRITISH AIRWAYS
Dave joined British Airways as a pilot in 1993, with a degree in Aeronautical Engineering and 3 years’ experience working in international law firms. As well as his flying experience, he is currently a training captain and examiner on the A380. He has over 20 years’ experience in airline management including 11 years operating at Board level in the roles of Chief Training Pilot and Head of Flight Technical and Training.
For 7 years Dave was BA’s AOC nominated post holder for training for around 19,000 pilots and cabin crew. In this role he introduced many innovative training programmes. He is a firm believer in embedding leadership skills into the core of learning and has championed the EASA move to competency-based pilot training.
During a varied career, Dave has worked with external organisations including NATS and the CAA, negotiated on technical and training issues for BA with its pilot union BALPA, and was brought in by BA to turn around a major estate project to create a single Learning Academy in a £40m project. He was privileged to be deeply involved in BA’s sponsorship of the London 2012 Olympics, flying the Olympic Torch from Greece to the UK and leading the post-Olympic BA and RAF fly-past down the Mall.
Petrut is a transplant surgeon with an interest in human performance, organisational behaviour and surgical safety. His research has applied aviation models to improving healthcare systems. He has 13 years experience in postgraduate education, spanning basic science, clinical, leadership and human factors training.
PETRUT GOGALNICEANU
MBBS, MEd, FRCS (Gen Surg)
SENIOR FELLOW
ABDOMINAL TRANSPLANT SURGEON
JAMES HARLOW
CAPTAIN
BRITISH AIRWAYS
Jim has been an airline pilot for 22 years. He has 14,000 flying hours of experience on Boeing 747, 757, 767 and A320s in the past and is currently a B777 Captain. He is both a technical trainer on the B777 (TRI/TRE) and a human factors trainer and examiner for all BA pilots.
His human factors role within BA covers many things. First and foremost and the part he is most passionate about is training; be it in a classroom, the simulator or most importantly on the aircraft.
He also helps write and design training packages as well as being part of a group who are responsible for ensuring that all BA flight crew achieve the highest levels of HF skills, defining competency standards and maintaining regulatory compliance.
Wai is a consultant Obstetrician and Gynaecologist at North Middlesex University Hospital London and Honorary Senior Lecturer at UCL and Associate Professor at St George’s International School of Medicine.
He is the senior organiser of the RCOG Masterclass in Management of Massive Obstetric Haemorrhage and one of the founder trustees of Haemorrhage After Childbirth Foundation, a charity dedicated to teaching skills to doctors and midwives on how to manage obstetric haemorrhage. He was the past RCOG National Convenor of Basic Practical Skills Course and has been awarded the RCOG Sims Black Travelling Professorship (Jordan/Palestine) as well as the RCOG Bernhard Baron Bursary.
WAI YOONG
MBBCHBAO (Belf), MD (Lon) FRCOG
CONSULTANT
OBSTETRICS & GYNAECOLOGY
STEPHEN WHITE
CAPTAIN
BRITISH AIRWAYS
Stephen was a British Airways cadet pilot and in his 26 years in the airline has flown Boeing 737s and 777s as well as Airbus A320s, A380s and is currently a Training Captain on A350s. He has always been passionate about training, starting as a flying instructor with Singapore Airlines prior to BA where he has been training and examining for over two decades.
He has been very privileged to have operated Royal flights and VVIP charters for BA.
Ben is a principle GP in Oxfordshire. He started his medical career as an academic paediatric surgery trainee in Oxford. During this time, he worked in a busy tertiary teaching hospital and has published multiple papers. He has a long-standing interest in education, having previously set-up a number of courses. He has also been actively involved in teaching Oxford medical students.
Ben has always been very fascinated with how teams and individuals cope under stress and how this affects team dynamics and productivity. Ben is interested in moving Human factors into the primary care setting. He passionately believes that Human factors has a great deal to offer to primary care including improvements in safety, efficiency and leadership.
BEN SOUKUP
MBBS BSc MRCS MRCGP DCH PGCert HealthRes
PARTNER
GENERAL PRACTICE
NAYAN MISTRY
SENIOR FIRST OFFICER
BRITISH AIRWAYS
Nayan has been a professional airline pilot since 2005 and is currently a Senior First Officer on the A350 at British Airways. He has previously flown the B737, A320 and A380 on both short and long haul routes.
Nayan has been assessing and developing human factors skills in pilots for the last 5 years in his role as a trainer and examiner. He has a keen interest in how human behaviour and interaction can influence safety and how to use this knowledge to improve team performance.
Having worked in the NHS since 2012, Matteo is a SpR in Obstetrics and Gynaecology and a qualified Human Factors Sim Faculty member for UCL partners and his local PROMPT courses.
Using his experiences across multiple industries, including aviation, sailing and the emergency services, he is passionate about facilitating the adaptation of their Human Factor and Crew/Crisis resource management successes into clinical practice within the NHS. Drawing on his own experiences of burnout he is also an avid advocate for healthcare practitioner wellbeing, Just Culture creation and combating the negative effects that fatigue and workplace stressors have on an individual’s performance and their capacity for error mitigation.
MATTEO DEMARTINO
REGISTRAR
OBSTETRICS & GYNAECOLOGY
MAUD NAUTA
MBBCH DRCOG DIP Fam Plan
GENERAL PRACTICE
Maud is a family physician from Camden Health Improvement Practice (CHIP), a practice which serves the high risk homeless population in London. She qualified from Rotterdam, in the Netherlands and completed her GP training in North London.
She is a member of the Clinical Human Factors Group, a certified Human Factors/Crew Resource Management instructor and has an interest particularly in reducing errors between primary and secondary care interface along with the use of checklists in mitigating medical errors. She also lectures regularly on Human Factors at Southbank University and Middlesex University.