Conversations to Cultivate Change - Episode 2

Conversations to Cultivate Change: Leading with purpose - Professor Robina Coker on building a career, mentorship and research

In this episode, host Dr Keerti Gedela is joined by Professor Robina Coker, professor of practice and consultant in respiratory medicine at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust. Robina was previously the clinical director of the NIHR Clinical Research Network North West London, before its transition as part of the NIHR Research Delivery Network.

Drawing on over 35 years in clinical medicine, Professor Coker reflects on her early inspirations, the evolving realities of working in the NHS, and the enduring values of patient-centred care. She shares thought-provoking insights on medical education, compassionate leadership, and the importance of nurturing diverse perspectives within clinical and research teams.

Robina also discusses her leadership journey and the lessons she has carried forward - shaped by personal mentors and a deep belief in the power of encouragement and inclusion.

This inspiring conversation highlights the role of reflection, resilience, and representation in shaping a more equitable and innovative future in health and care research.

Listen now to learn why leadership rooted in authenticity and support can transform teams and systems.

Host Dr Keerti Gedela is a clinician based at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, and leads research inclusion work for the NIHR North London Regional Research Delivery Network.

Transcript

00:00:09:06 - 00:00:37:13

Keerti

Hello and welcome to the podcast of the National Institute for Health and Care Research, the NIHR. My name is Keerti Gedela. I'm your host, and I'm really excited to share conversations with different NHS and research staff to understand challenges around equality, diversity and inclusion. So let's make a start and get ready for some conversations to cultivate change.

00:00:37:15 - 00:00:59:01

Keerti

All right. Today I have the privilege to be talking with Professor Robina Coker. Robina is a professor of practice and a consultant in respiratory medicine based at the Hammersmith hospital. Robina, you've worked in clinical medicine for over 35 years.

00:00:59:07 - 00:01:18:20

Keerti

And you specialise in respiratory medicine with a subspecialty expertise in sarcoidosis and interstitial lung disease. So I want to take you some years back, if that’s OK. And ask you what motivated you into career medicine.

00:01:18:22 - 00:01:24:14

Robina

Yes. Thank you Keerti. And I’ll start by saying it's a real privilege to be here. So thank you for asking me to come.

00:01:24:16 - 00:01:47:20

Robina

It's quite interesting when I look back, because I realise that my interest in research probably began at quite an early age. I was always interested in science and the natural world in particular, and how things work. And when I was eight, I was very unwell for quite a number of months with pneumonia followed by asthma, and I had to take quite a long time off school.

00:01:47:22 - 00:02:07:15

Robina

And I think that's when I realised how important it is to have good health, and how hard it is when that's taken away from you. And I realised what a valuable role can be played by those in the healthcare professions. And then later on, when I was at secondary school, I realised I wanted to be a part of that.

00:02:07:17 - 00:02:11:14

Robina

And that's when I decided to study medicine.

00:02:11:16 - 00:02:23:01

Keerti

Have you, in any, have you been happy with that journey? Is that something that you feel positive now? Some years later? Do you have any regrets?

00:02:23:03 - 00:02:33:16

Robina

No I don't. I don't think I have any regrets. I was, I was very fortunate. I had quite a few people give me advice and talk about a career in medicine.

00:02:33:18 - 00:02:49:01

Robina

Nowadays there’s a lot of advice out there for people. And there's a lot online. There was very much less in those days. I do say to people, you must think about what it's going to ask of you, because although it's been made much easier, particularly for women to study medicine, and for women to work less than full time, train less than full time, and so on, at the end of the day, and I mean, literally at the end of the day, at 5:00, when you get that call about a patient who's gone, who's deteriorating, you cannot just say, well, actually, I'm off now and I've got a theatre ticket and I’m meeting my friend in half an hour.

00:04:35:09 - 00:04:52:14

Robina

Actually, it's the patient in front of you who has to take priority. You may have a colleague you can hand over to, but you're going to have to assess that patient and then handover. And that will take at least 30 minutes usually. And so I think people need to realise you cannot. You always have to prioritise patients above everything else.

00:04:52:14 - 00:05:16:23

Robina

And if you can do that and that's what you want to do, then that's fine. But if you can’t, I think you might want to think about something else or you do a less demanding specialty. You know, there are outpatient specialties which allow you to work part time. My cousin is a doctor in the States, and, she worked two and a half days a week, and she was a dermatologist, which was very much an office based job, so she didn't have to deal with emergencies.

00:05:16:23 - 00:05:28:09

Robina

She pulled out of hospital medicine as soon as she could so that she could have her children, and spend time with them. So there are options. But people just have to think about, think about it carefully.

00:05:28:11 - 00:05:42:02

Keerti

No, I think that's really interesting. And Robina I've always thought that type of very robust work ethic is the foundation of the NHS.

00:05:42:04 - 00:06:06:08

Keerti

And I wonder if I just take your perspective on this is how that's changing actually. I mean, when you started as a clinician, when I started as a clinician, the environment is very different now. The dynamic related to the internet, digital media, etcetera, etcetera. it's dramatically changed the landscape really, hasn't it? And I wonder, and the NHS.

00:06:06:09 - 00:06:35:04

Robina

Yes, I think it has. I think the thing that really has made a difference for junior doctors and made their lives harder, has been the fragmentation of the team, because of the fact that everybody work shifts now. And obviously I'm not suggesting that when I was training what we did was a good thing. For instance, when I was a registrar, I would be on call from Friday morning to Monday evening in the same hospital, spending the weekend there, and there would be no guaranteed rest.

00:06:35:06 - 00:07:00:01

Robina

And I'm not suggesting one should go back to that. But shift work is very disruptive. And it's not just disruptive in terms of your sleep rate rhythms and all the rest of it and the impact on health. But it's also disruptive because it disrupts the continuity of team work and the continuity of care for the patient. So when I was very junior, I learnt very quickly.

00:07:00:03 - 00:07:18:00

Robina

I still remember the first patient I ever gave [named treatment] to. I said to the nurse, well we better give them some [named treatment]. We’d learnt about [named treatment] at medical school. My registrar was somewhere else looking after patients in A&E, and I was on the ward and I gave the lowest dose I thought I could get away with. But you know, there's that thing.

00:07:18:02 - 00:07:35:22

Robina

Well I’ve never prescribed it before, but people trained to prescribe so prescribe and then the beauty of having some continuity of care is that you then, you can see the patient in a few hours or the following morning, and you realise they are a bit less breathless, you know, they had heart failure. So that gives you courage to give it regularly. And maybe we should perhaps give a little bit more.

00:07:35:24 - 00:07:51:03

Robina

And you learn so quickly, but then you learn that, well, it might, you know, they might lose potassium and so their potassium result might come back lower. What are you going to do about that? So you learn very quickly because you follow people through. And I think that's the other element about it. You don't have the same continuity of teamwork.

00:07:51:03 - 00:08:08:17

Robina

So you don't work with the same consultants and the same registrar. So you don't build those relationships and you don't have the continuity of care. So that patient that you would now see in the emergency department, they would be moved to a ward within a few hours, and you might never see them again. And then you'll be dealing with the next case.

00:08:08:17 - 00:08:30:06

Robina

And I think that's detrimental to your training as well. So it's very tricky getting that balance. And I think when it was tough, at least people were all together. Let's say, you know, we're having a bad evening. Let's get some pizza in, and have a meal together. And that built relationships. And I think all those things have made life much more difficult for junior doctors.

00:10:10:02 - 00:10:22:00

Keerti

So out of interest, if a colleague that said to you I wouldn't do medicine, what would you say now to a young person who's considering a career entering medicine?

00:10:22:02 - 00:10:26:03

Robina

I'd say if that's what you really want to do, do it. Absolutely.

00:10:26:05 - 00:10:49:19

Robina

I think one of the real advantages of a career in medicine is the variety of careers and opportunities that are available at the end of it, so you can be so many different things. You could be an eye surgeon or hand surgeon. You could be working in the emergency department. You could be running an air ambulance service.

00:10:49:19 - 00:11:15:22

Robina

You could be, just outpatient based, like my cousin who did part time dermatology. You could be looking after older people with a whole range of co-morbidities and helping them to live independently. You could be family doctor, seeing people in the community. You could be doing public health, you could be working overseas, thinking about infection or public health.

00:11:15:24 - 00:11:42:10

Robina

You could be working in the laboratory, doing cutting edge medical research. You could go into medical journalism and just highlight all the all the social ills and, and health ills that, you know, beset us at the moment. So there is an opportunity to influence for good in whatever setting.

00:11:54:09 - 00:12:10:15

Keerti

Yeah, absolutely. I not only agree, but I love that Robina and I think, moves me on actually to just make a comment on on you because you do have that very broad, diverse perspective, actually.

00:12:10:17 - 00:12:30:16

Keerti

I'm glad you're a medical educator. You teach Imperial medical students, and I feel they need to hear that thing, to really believe it and understand it because, you know, there were generations through the pandemic and things may have felt a bit low at that time. And they need to understand the wealth of benefits there are to a career in medicine and in research.

00:12:30:16 - 00:12:58:17

Keerti

And and you've highlighted that in its board depth really and actually, I think that says something about you. And I wonder where that's come from, because I would say you as a leader are someone who really does offer encouragement, and you do it in a way that's clearly very strong, but also quite light touch. You're keen for the person that you're engaging with to give their perspective.

00:12:58:19 - 00:13:24:19

Keerti

You're keen for those diverse perspectives to thrive. You're looking for that individual in that team to kind of have that freedom to exercise what they want to do. And to exercise their vision.

00:13:37:02 - 00:13:43:21

Robina

Well, that's very kind of you Keerti. And I take that as a great compliment. It's yes, it is a product of a deliberate choice.

00:13:43:21 - 00:14:10:02

Robina

And I think there are a number of factors that have led to that. So when I reflect on the home I grew up in, I grew up in an intellectual, liberal and liberal professional home, but with lots of exposure to arts and culture, alongside interests in science and so on. So I think that's one one factor that probably influenced me.

00:14:10:02 - 00:14:36:21

Robina

So I was always encouraged to, be open to my creative side as well as explore science and medicine. I was given two pieces of useful advice when I was training, as a medical student, a very good mentor said to me, he quoted Shakespeare to me and he said, to thine own self be true, so be true to yourself in 21st century language.

00:14:36:23 - 00:15:16:18

Robina

And I think that's so important. And I think, we are all guilty of it. But I think that social media, has probably heightened the problem for young people, particularly at the moment. We are so taken up with our image and others perception of us, and it is so easy. I mean I think the pressures have always been there, but I do think they're very intense at the moment, the pressures are so strong to conform to an idealised image or to conform to what you think other people think you should be.

00:15:16:20 - 00:15:36:08

Robina

And there's obviously a place to conform in society. We need some, you know, we need rules. We need to respect each other. There are boundaries, that's important. But I think being true to yourself. So learning what your strengths are, learning where your weaknesses are as well. And your blind spots. But being true to yourself is really important.

00:15:36:09 - 00:15:56:05

Robina

So I think I found that really useful. I think the other piece of advice came when I was studying for my PhD, and, I did a lab based PhD, in a laboratory full of basic scientists. So I was the only medical doctor in that, in that lab. And that was a great three and a half years during my career.

00:15:56:07 - 00:16:36:18

Robina

And I had a fantastic head of department who was very generous and never treated us as though we were junior to him. He used to say, well, I was born before you were, you know, so I’m a bit older. But one of the things he said to me, he said to me, Robina, when you are recruiting and when you are building your team.

He said, don't worry about recruiting people who are brighter than you. He said the fundamental mistake that people make when they're at the top of a, head of a department or head of a team, is they feel threatened by somebody they meet who is more intelligent than they are.

00:17:38:00 - 00:17:52:23

Robina

And so they don't appoint them, And so they only ever appoint people who are sort of a little bit beneath them. And that way they feel they are in control. He said, don't be threatened. Get really bright people in. And he said, if you're in a meeting, you know, a departmental meeting one afternoon, they ask you a question you don't know the answer to.

00:17:52:23 - 00:18:07:13

Robina

You say, well, that's a very good question, Steve. Why don't you go and look it up? Because I don't know the answer. And tell us all next week. And he said, you'll get a buzz. And he said, you'll get really bright people doing well and they'll succeed in their careers. And then he said, people will say, well, where did you train?

And so I've always remembered that, and I've always thought it's really, really important to cast aside one's own insecurities about what one might or might not have achieved or know and actually say, who are the best people I can involve here, and if they do something that’s absolutely fantastic that I couldn’t even have thought of.

00:18:33:06 - 00:18:49:20

Robina

Fine. Great. Let them get on with it. So yes, I've always wanted to encourage people. I do believe that most people come to work wanting to do a good job. And, you know, there are a few who don't, but they're in a very small minority, I think. So I want to encourage people.

00:18:49:20 - 00:19:03:16

Robina

I think most people respond to encouragement. Most people respond to being supported and to being given that freedom and being able to use their imagination, their creativity in whatever they're doing. So I think those are some the reasons.

00:19:03:18 - 00:19:12:20

Keerti

Yeah, no, thank you. But it kind of cuts to a bottom line of, if we want better societies, need to get the best out of people at this.

00:19:12:22 - 00:19:40:05

Keerti

And if we keep. playing, you know, an individual game made perhaps based on, I often think about this related to how we're educated and why it is we might do exactly what your mentor said. Why is it that we choose people in the team that we feel are less smart than us, so that we stay in charge and we have the power, for example, where does that necessarily come from?

00:19:40:05 - 00:20:10:16

Keerti

From our conditioning and our upbringing. And we know that that's not going to drive anything. But segregation, really. And not very collective, working communities. Yeah. No. Absolutely. And that's maybe one thing that's coming out from the generational shifts, that actually it's been intrinsic to how you work, you know, all over the last 35 years. But that is a conversation I do think is growing.

00:20:10:17 - 00:20:35:18

Keerti

That compassionate leadership. The idea of, you know, functioning teams. And we've often even seen that from businesses. You know, inclusive businesses and how they're forming their teams and how they celebrate diversity. Purely for the benefit of their game. It's not a social justice issue. Which I'm very passionate about actually, that we don't talk about equality, diversity and inclusion within the social justice space.

00:20:35:18 - 00:20:43:14

Keerti

It's not that it's not about social justice, but it's actually more about people, societies, health equality, moving forward.

00:20:43:14 - 00:20:48:02

Robina

Yes. And getting better outcomes. And smart companies recognise that.

00:20:48:04 - 00:20:57:03

Keerti

Exactly. Yeah yeah yeah I think that leads us on a little bit to the next question. In terms of clinical research. You were clinical director, it was a decade at the NIHR North West London Clinical Research Network, which is now transitioning, new horizons, new change.

00:20:57:05 - 00:21:21:08

Keerti

Ticky question probably, Robina, but what do you see as the top achievements or successes.

00:21:21:10 - 00:21:50:20

Robina

Well, I think the first success, which is undoubtedly a very significant achievement, is the is the growth in primary care research.

00:22:13:08 - 00:22:37:11

Robina

And so again it is about investing, getting the right people in and then saying, right now you run with it. And I have worked in hospitals all my career and, I really have no experience of working in general practice at all. So I don't feel I can possibly advise something about how to set up research in primary care.

00:22:37:13 - 00:23:00:11

Robina

So I have been very dependent on listening to my colleagues who work in those settings and saying ‘okay, so what do you think we need to do? What do you think would work?’ And they've come back at every stage and said, ‘this is our proposal, but it's going to need some investment’. And we've been very fortunate that our executive have backed us and supported us when we've gone to them and said, ‘look, we think we need to invest more in primary care research’.

00:23:00:13 - 00:23:18:21

Robina

But, you know, the teams have come up with very concrete proposals and justifications for those proposals. And they've got a logical plan and it's worked. It's paid off. But it is always a risk because you look at the sums and you think, that’s quite a lot of money, but that’s fine, okay. Go see what you can do. And this is what they’ve done. So all credit to them. They’ve done an absolutely fantastic job.

00:23:18:21 - 00:23:36:16

Robina

And I think that is one of the major achievements. And I think it's very significant that now the new Research Delivery Networks recognise achievements in primary care and recognise that we must not lose this. We have to protect this and develop it.

00:23:36:18 - 00:24:02:00

Robina

So that's been one great achievement. And then I think the other thing was, well, the other two things were, initiatives that, were started during the pandemic because pandemics are always a great stimulus to innovation. And again, this, this relies on other people's work, not my, my personal work. But we set up the North West London Clinical Trials Alliance.

00:24:02:02 - 00:24:26:20

Robina

And this was to develop an urgent COVID vaccine studies. And unlike previously we had a collaborative model. So it was a sort of taxi rank model. So in the past, different sites across north west London would’ve competed for commercial studies. But this was set up with the idea that right, okay. There’s commercial study A here. You’re all in a queue, but you're all together.

00:24:27:00 - 00:24:47:19

Robina

Which of you would like to take that study? Okay. So Trust one says it's going to take study A. Right, you go and work with that, run with it, get on with it, complete it. Study B comes along and Trust two says ‘I can take that’ okay. And then they run with that one. So they're not competing. They're just saying yeah I'm ready for that.

00:24:47:19 - 00:25:11:21

Robina

I've got facilities. We've got the patient population. We can do that. So who is best suited? So it was a very collaborative approach which hadn't been followed before in north west London. There were actually similar initiatives around the country, so we weren't completely alone in that. But we were very successful in recruiting to COVID vaccine studies. And it's now being extended across north west London.

00:25:11:23 - 00:25:38:01

Robina

And, it was recognised to be pretty novel in its method of working. And the alliance was shortlisted for The New Statesman’s inaugural Positive Impact Awards in 2022, in recognition of its contribution to healthcare research. So we were very excited and delighted about that. So that's the second, thing. And then the thing I'm really proud of as well, is the Schools Research Network, and that was also set up during the pandemic.

00:25:38:01 - 00:26:06:20

Robina

And that's a collaboration. We have over 60 schools involved. And it's really interesting. These are primary schools, these are secondary schools. They're state schools, they're private schools. It’s a collaboration with Imperial College London, Listen to Act, which is a community based organisation, and the ARC Northwest London. And what's fantastic about that is that, the school students have been actively involved in helping to design the research.

00:26:06:20 - 00:26:24:14

Robina

So researchers have gone along and said ‘well, we want to do a study on this’. And in fact, we offered, we said, ‘well, what would you like to do research on or have research and be involved in what sort of research? And they said mental health. And this was in 2021, 2022. So we said fine, so some researchers went along and said, ’well, we want to do this study in mental health.’

00:26:24:14 - 00:26:39:14

Robina

‘And these are the questions we'd like to ask.’ And so the students, you know, they’ve had focus groups and the students have come along and said, ‘well, I don't think that one works that because you won't get anybody interested in that, you know, you need to ask this and you need to ask that’. And the researchers have actually gone back and said ‘we need to change because we're not going to get engagement.’

00:26:39:19 - 00:27:06:10

Robina

And they've changed the questions. They've changed the design of the studies. So the students have helped to co-create those studies, and they've been enormously successful. And that's led to very high levels of engagement and positive feedback, not just from the students, from the teachers as well. The teachers being really interested. And it's also interesting because particularly with the mental health studies, you know, we often when we start recruiting, for instance, to a randomised, placebo controlled intervention study in secondary care.

00:27:06:10 - 00:27:22:03

Robina

And you say to the patients you know ‘we don't know what you'll get, we don't know whether you'll get a dummy drug, sugar pill or whether you'll get the active drug, you won't be able to know, we won't know. And we don't know whether you'll get any benefit from this study, but you know, you'll be doing it for the future, so they do it out of the goodness of their heart.

00:27:22:05 - 00:27:41:17

Robina

But what's really interesting is that some of these, focus groups that were part of the research, because groups of students were coming together and they were actually being encouraged and enabled to talk about their mental health. That was actually therapeutic in their, you know, selves. And they've given feedback about that. So and the students could see the benefit.

00:27:41:17 - 00:28:05:08

Robina

Sorry, the teachers could see the benefits. And I think, you know, because they were professional facilitators and clinical psychologists coming in, that was enormously beneficial. So yes, it was research, but it was benefiting the participants. I mean, it's really interesting.

00:28:05:10 - 00:28:29:01

Keerti

The other fascinating thing, just because I remember it now that you're talking about it was how the network has elevated skills for young people.

00:28:29:01 - 00:28:48:03

Keerti

Yes. So the young people have said, you know, we want to know how to have basic skills in managing mental health emergencies, which actually, I have to say, when you hear that, it just warms your heart. Because that's what young people are saying. And we might take for granted that that’s what they want, but also presentation skills.

00:28:48:03 - 00:28:57:19

Keerti

Yes. You know, you’ve got leaders from Imperial tailoring presentation skills for young people. It's phenomenal. Yes. Huge amounts to come from. Yes.

00:28:57:19 - 00:29:11:12

Robina

And absolutely. Then the other nice aspect, of course, is that we're not only involving the children or the students in that research who will be, because they're in north west London, they will be from very many different and diverse communities throughout north west London.

00:29:11:14 - 00:29:33:00

Robina

But you're engaging their parents because at the very least, their parents have to consent to their child to take part. And so they have to read the participants information sheet and read about study and learn about study. So they're actually getting some exposure and they're learning that actually, you know, it was useful to him. He liked it.

00:29:33:00 - 00:29:43:11

Robina

You know, so they're getting very positive feedback and having a positive sense of research. So we're reaching out to all sorts of diverse communities that way.

00:29:43:13 - 00:30:03:00

Keerti

Yeah. There was a wonderful community member, she gave a talk at the sickle cell awareness disease event, and she was actually saying that one of the things you really need to do as an NHS, or academic space to build trust, is you need to involve people's families.

00:30:03:11 - 00:30:25:03

Keerti

The wider community. We trust them. You know, we will speak to our parents about this. And what they say and what they feel is going to be important, so it needs to be engaging and it ties in with that, doesn't it?

00:30:25:05 - 00:30:44:22

Keerti

Really the last question for you. Is there anything that if you had wishes, for example, how would you want to see clinical research progress or not necessarily change, maybe evolve, but where would you like to see progress?

00:30:44:24 - 00:30:51:09

Robina

Well, I think there are two key areas. The first is in terms of patient and volunteer perception of research.

00:30:51:15 - 00:31:18:06

Robina

So we've talked about some really good examples, but we're not reaching everywhere and we're not reaching everybody.

00:31:42:03 - 00:32:02:02

Robina

So anything we can do to build that trust, I think is really important. So I think that is going to have to be a focus.

00:32:02:04 - 00:32:37:12

Robina

And the second thing I think actually is, is working on engagement from healthcare professionals. And I'm not just talking about doctors, I'm talking about the wider healthcare professions. Because there's no doubt in this country that our healthcare services are under enormous pressure. And we know that patient satisfaction has plummeted. People are very concerned about access to primary care, timely access to emergency care, timely access to an ambulance.

00:32:37:14 - 00:33:00:24

Robina

And so it's a very difficult environment, I think in which to prosecute successful clinical research, because clinical research is always seen as an add on, a luxury and a nice to have and a good to do. And it's not always seen as fundamental. And we know that, for instance, hospitals that are active in clinical research have a better outcomes.

00:33:01:02 - 00:33:28:24

Robina

And that's not just for the patients who are involved in research. It's for all patients in that institution. And many of us know that. But I'm not sure how widely broadcast that is. And we know it's great. It's a great thing for recruitment, recruiting clinical staff. It's great for staff retention. But unless we make time available for healthcare professionals to do research as part of their clinical work, I think we're going to struggle.

00:33:29:01 - 00:34:03:09

Robina

And it's that's always been regarded as a bit too expensive and a bit too difficult. But we do insist that, for instance, doctors and many other allied healthcare professions have time for CPD, personal professional development, and they have time to teach others. So we regard education as important. I think we need to be seeing research on the same level and in the same way and not I'm not suggesting that everybody should be a laboratory researcher, or that everybody should be publishing and in high level journals all the time.

00:34:03:11 - 00:34:21:03

Robina

But it might just be saying, okay, so this, this study running in my department, and I know that Bob's doing that and I know he would like me to have a look through my clinics and see if there are any patients. And, you know, how can I help with that. And having a bit of time to do that and having that recognised as part of what you do.

00:34:21:03 - 00:34:42:04

Robina

Rather than it just being, well I'll try and do it after 5:00. And actually, no, I won't because... And as you say, it's difficult now because there's less good will to work and go over and above, normal working hours. So people don't want to do that. If they can start off at 5:00 and help their son with their homework, they're going to do that.

00:34:42:06 - 00:34:55:21

Robina

So that's much more the attitude. So I think we really do need to think about how we motivate, engage and reward and recognise people for their efforts and make it integral to what they do in their in their daily work.

00:34:55:23 - 00:35:12:15

Keerti

Absolutely makes sense. Made me think of the point that often it's that communication challenge between a doctor and perhaps a potential research participant, maybe a patient, and how they're communicating about research.

00:35:12:15 - 00:35:37:12

Keerti

The more we do it, the more it becomes part of our everyday, the better we can communicate it. And have the language and articulation to make it much more part of routine care. Much more embedded in trust and honesty. It's fundamental, isn’t it? Robina, thank you so much. I'm really grateful that you've actually tackled some what big topics.

00:35:37:14 - 00:36:02:00

Keerti

And I'd say that, you've talked a lot, although you might not use those words. You're clearly talking about humility and honesty within our roles, within people who are medicine and research. And that's, you know, that's intrinsic to your leadership style and who you are. So thank you so much. A real privilege to speak with you. I've loved working with you in this last 1 to 2 years.

00:36:02:02 - 00:36:15:12

Keerti

And I wish you all the absolute best. I think there is lots that the new system needs to learn from the CRN and from your leadership, and I look forward to that happening.

00:36:15:14 - 00:36:21:22

Robina

Thank you very much, Keerti. It's been fantastic having you as part of the team. And it's been a great pleasure to be with you today.

00:36:21:24 - 00:36:25:16

Keerti

Thank you.

00:36:25:18 - 00:36:43:12

Keerti

This was an episode of the NIHR podcast, part of our EDI series, Conversations to Cultivate Change. I'm Keerti Gedela and thank you for listening. For more information about the NIHR, you can visit our website - nihr.ac.uk.