Professor Sir George Alberti

Short abstract

Health tsars: spin or substance?: Eight health directors (“tsars”) were appointed from 1999 to 2002. Katherine Burke asked them to summarise their achievements and other people to assess their work. A ninth “tsar”, Dr Sue Roberts, was appointed in March 2003 to cover diabetes. The full text is accessible at www.bmj.com

My achievements: I perceive my role as acting as a link with the medical profession in acute trusts and primary care; bringing messages back from “the field” into our branch in the health department; acting as a clinical “reality check” in the department; and working with clinicians in the department on clinical issues.

In addition I look at long term needs of emergency care, advise trusts and health authorities when asked to do so, help ambulance trusts develop new ways of working, and promulgate new aspects of emergency care nationwide.

I feel that I and my colleagues have raised the profile of emergency care and improved the timeliness and quality of emergency care.

What others say

Peter Bradley, president of the Ambulance Service Association: Professor Alberti has been a huge breath of fresh air. He's made it his business to find out what each bit of the emergency care system does. He's spent time working shifts on ambulances in London and the North East, and he is encouraging emergency department staff to go on ambulances so that they can understand what ambulance work is all about.

He is considering radical ideas such as ambulance staff working in emergency departments and emergency care centres, and having the remit to treat more people at home and to prescribe drugs such as antibiotics. These ideas may have been talked about before, but they hadn't had so much support from the top. He's also trying to make sure that people with minor injuries have access to emergency care centres across England. (See p 117.)

Figure 1.

Professor Sir George Alberti

National clinical director for emergency access

Appointed: September 2002