Review Team Biographies

Professor J.G. Steele

Jimmy Steele graduated in dentistry from Dundee in 1985. After hospital appointments in Dundee, Perth and Glasgow and obtaining FDS in 1988, he was appointed as a lecturer in Restorative Dentistry in Newcastle in 1989. His PhD was a large scale epidemiological survey of oral health in older adults, funded by DH and awarded in 1994. He was made a personal Senior Lecturer in Restorative Dentistry in 1999 and then a personal chair in Oral Health Services Research in 2003. He is also a clinical dental specialist and works as consultant in Restorative Dentistry in Newcastle. His experience in the epidemiology of adult dental health is extensive and has included leading roles in several large scale national surveys (including NDNS 65+, ADHS 1998 and CDHS 2003). His health services research includes primary care, quality of life and health economics. He is oral and dental lead for the UKCRN.

Janet Clarke

Janet qualified as a dentist from Birmingham University in 1981 and has worked in both general dental practice and the salaried dental service. She obtained her Masters in Community Dental Health in 1989 and has a Diploma in Health Services Management. She has just completed six years as elected Chair of the BDA’s Central Committee for Community and Public Health Dentistry and during that time was lead staff side negotiator for the new salaried dentists’ contract. In her day job, she is Clinical Director of the salaried dental service in Birmingham and currently Deputy Director of the Provider Services in Heart of Birmingham teaching PCT.

Tom Wilson

Tom is the Director of Contracts and IM&T at NHS Milton Keynes. Tom is responsible for ensuring that there are contracts in place with over 180 organisations from whom the NHS purchases clinical services from whether it is a hospital, GP, dentist or any other service provider. The contracts must be affordable to the NHS and also ensure that a high quality service is delivered.

He sits on NICE Technology Appraisal Committees and is a member of the English National Diabetic Retinopathy Screening Programme Advisory Board as well as undertaking quality review visits of screening programmes throughout the country.

Eric Rooney BDS MSc DDPH (RCS) England

Eric Rooney is Consultant in Dental Public Health for 4 PCTs in Cumbria & Lancashire .

Qualified as a dentist in 1983, he has held a number of roles in the NHS including Clinical Director, Locality General Manager and Medical Director.

He was involved in dental policy development through the British Dental Association and in 1998/2000 was a member of the Chief Dental Officer’s Modernising NHS Dentistry Team, which laid the foundations for Options for Change. As Cumbria & Lancashire Strategic Health Authority advisor, he was part of the Chief Dental Officer’s Senior Dental Leadership Team and was involved in a number of ad-hoc Department of Health Groups In 2007 he was lead negotiator for NHS employers in the development of new terms and conditions of service for salaried dentists.

In addition to his duties as Consultant in Dental Public Health he is the Director of the Dental Observatory which has a central role in the National Dental Epidemiology Programme.