Our Working Group yesterday held a minute’s silence for Dr Craig Wakeham, the Chief Clinical Commissioning Officer at NHS Dorset Clinical Commissioning Group, who passed away on Saturday 18 April 2020, aged 59. Craig had tested positive for COVID-19.
We were lucky enough to have the pleasure of working with Craig over the lifetime of the DCR and for some of us, many more years. Craig was one of our Programme Board members and regularly met the team during monthly meetings which were often followed by CCIO sessions at Upton House, Poole.
But typically, Craig went beyond what was asked of him – we often used him for acceptance testing as we moved some of the new DCR releases into live. And he worked with representatives from our team on the Wessex Cancer Alliance (WCA) Rapid Diagnostic Service Digital Task Force. He was an active member of the group, researching and promoting it within the WCA. And he was also part of the team that evaluated the tender propositions for the Cancer Follow Up pathway.
He was a champion of rural general practice and a pioneer for integrated nursing teams, having lived and worked as a much-loved GP in Cerne Abbas for many years. As the statement from CCG says, Craig had been “instrumental in the advance of digital clinical information across Dorset which has been extremely useful at the present time.”
We ran a case study with Craig back in 2017 when the DCR was in its infancy. One of the take-home messages from Craig was the vital importance of electronic records and that health and social care professionals needed to embrace them: “I would say the risk of not having a record or not having patient information, is what should be of real concern. Not having the information available might pose a significant risk to health and well-being. The Dorset Care Record will enhance treatment.”
Craig spoke last month at the Wessex Care Record annual meeting where he touched on the work of the Dorset Intelligence and Insight Service and its value in sharing information with Primary Care Networks to understand specific demographic issues in various geographical locations. His energy was always directed in moving healthcare forward for the people of Dorset.
Commenting on our planned citizen portal, he said it must be of real value and not tokenistic: “We need to support this and I see it really helping in many areas of care, particularly in supporting people with long-term medical conditions such as diabetes, hypertension, asthma, epilepsy, to name but a few – and this would be a really good outcome for patients.”
Ends
Craig was of enormous help to the DCR programme. He believed passionately in the concept of a single shared record. I will be forever grateful for the time, knowledge, advice and guidance he gave in support of the programme.
Craig was a huge support to me and the entire team at my mhealth. We are all going to miss him enormously.
I went to school with Craig and his wife Maria, aside from his professional loss this will be devastating for his family. This is such terribly sad news. My thought are with his family
Such sad news. Craig and I are related although we had not seen each other for many years.
Thinking of Maria and their 2 Boys.
Also his Dad and and brother and sister.
Rest in peace Craig x