The BMJ Publishing Group has appointed Stella Dutton, its executive director, as acting chief executive of the group, and Dr Kamran Abbasi, the BMJ's deputy editor, as the journal's acting editor.
The temporary appointments follow the resignation of Dr Richard Smith as editor of the BMJ and chief executive of the publishing group. Dr Smith, who leaves the BMJ on 29 July, is to become chief executive of a new European arm of the UnitedHealth Group, a US health-care company (29 May, p 1276).
While Dr Smith filled the dual role of chief executive of the BMJ Publishing Group and editor of the BMJ, the two roles are now to be separated.
Figure 1.
Stella Dutton
Credit: ULRIKE PREUSS
Mrs Dutton, who takes up the role of the group's acting chief executive, is also chairwoman elect of the International Association of Scientific, Technical and Medical Publishers. After graduating from London University with a chemistry degree, she worked for a number of years with Butterworth Scientific as publishing director for its science division.
After leaving Butterworths in 1990, she worked as a strategic planning and marketing director in the NHS and as director of publications at the Royal Pharmaceutical Society before taking up her current post. She is married with two daughters.
Figure 2.
Kamran Abbasi
Credit: MARK THOMAS
Dr Abbasi, who takes up the role as acting editor, followed a medical degree at Leeds University in 1992 with membership of the Royal College of Physicians. He joined the BMJ from the Royal London and St Bartholomew's hospitals in 1997 after training in internal medicine. He was seconded to the World Health Organization in 2000 as editor of its public health journal, the Bulletin.
Dr Abbasi helped create BMJ Learning, a publishing group website that caters for doctors' learning needs, and is head of the BMJ's international editions programme. He is married with four children and is a cricket writer for the publisher Wisden.