Dr Gareth Justin Richards

Justin is trained in medicine at the London Hospital Medical College, 1987-93.  Most of his Paediatric and Neonatal training has also been in London,  although he spent 2 years in Canada as a Neonatal Fellow. He was appointed as Consultant Neonatologist at St George’s Hospital, London, in 2007.  St George’s is a large regional referral unit, including the Paediatric specialities of surgery, ENT, neurology, neurosurgery, respiratory, gastroenterology, infectious diseases and genetics.  In addition there are large referral services for fetal medicine and maternal medicine.

Justin has two driving ambitions professionally – to provide the best possible care for babies and their families that he personally can, and to develop safer and better services for everyone within the NHS.

In his 15 years at St George’s he has held a number of senior leadership roles that have enabled him to keep moving towards his ambitions: Governance Lead for the Neonatal Unit, with particular interests in neonatal simulation, patient safety, human factors and guideline development (3 years). Service Lead for the Neonatal Unit (3 years). Clinical Director for Children’s Services (2 years). Divisional Chair for the Children’s, Women’s, Diagnostics, Therapies, Critical Care, Pharmacy and Community Services Division (3 years). Joint Neonatal Network Clinical Lead for South London (7 years). Divisional Medical Appraisal Lead at St George’s Hospital (2 years).

Relevant duties in these roles include oversight, chairing, and participating in serious incident reviews, investigating and responding to complaints, and mortality reviews – both of individual cases locally, and across the network.

He has also maintained an active interest in research throughout his career, with varied research interests including neonatal resuscitation and brain injury, and management of the patent ductus arteriosus.