Dr Sarrah Tayabali
Sarrah completed her medical degree with a distinction from University College London and a 1st Class Honours intercalated BSc. Having trained at London’s leading hospitals she is now a senior haematology registrar and has an interest in malignant haematology, health informatics and medical education.
Sarrah has a portfolio of leadership experience. She has represented her peers on Local Negotiating Committees and launched a new Junior Doctors Forum. She has also represented at national level when elected to the BMA UK Junior Doctors Committee. She has developed several quality improvement initiatives and presented her multi-pronged approach to reduce analgesia delays for patients with sickle cell disease at an international quality and safety conference.
Recognising the importance of workforce development, Sarrah has completed a Masters in Medical Education. She has led a number of education and mentoring projects, from organising teaching programmes, to leading a team of mentors at a local secondary school.
Most recently she completed a fellowship in early phase trials combined with health informatics and data science at UCLH. During this year she worked with a steering group to set up the first UK multi-site Myeloma registry in partnership with the National Institute of Health Research Health Informatics Collaborative. Here she got an insight into the challenges of working with complex real world healthcare data and ways to optimise its use, both to improve local practice and as a resource for research.
Outside work Sarrah loves drawing, good books and learning about history by travelling off the beaten track.
Reason for applying for the scheme
Sarrah believes clinician involvement is key to provide the strategic thinking and innovation to tackle the enormous challenges faced by our health system. However, to impact a system you first have to understand it and Sarrah feels this scheme provides an unparalleled opportunity to see how politics and economics impacts healthcare and understand the workings of higher-level NHS bodies and partner organisations. In the digital age medical leadership will be important in steering how best to apply technology to optimise healthcare delivery. Sarrah is excited to learn more about how big data is being harnessed to drive policy at national level and how clinicians are shaping digital transformation.
Sarrah hopes that by embarking on this fellowship she will learn how to drive changes beyond the immediate patient and learn to work across the system. By understanding how decisions made at the top filter down to a local level she aims to be well equipped to navigate the complexities of delivering healthcare and participate in high level decision making both locally and nationally. This will be particularly valuable as she is nearing the end of her training and will soon be a consultant.
Sarrah is delighted to be joining the National Cancer Programme within NHS England to help deliver on some of the key priority areas for the NHS Long Term plan. She looks forward to immersing herself in a new environment with fresh challenges and learning from both like minded individuals and those that bring a fresh perspective.
