09 September 2016

For immediate release

New Head of Community Independence Service for West London announced

The NHS and Social Care partnership that will run the Tri-borough Community Independence Service (CIS) from 1 November, have appointed Katherine Murray as the new Service Manager.

The partnership is:

• Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust (CNWL)

• Three GP Federations - London Central & West Unscheduled Care Collaborative (LCW), Central London Healthcare GP Federation, London Medical Association West London GP Federation

• West London Mental Health NHS Trust (WLMHT). Central London Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), together with West London and Hammersmith & Fulham CCGs appointed the partnership bid.

Working closely with Dr Anita Logendra, who is a GP and the Clinical Lead for CIS, Katherine will work to deliver the objectives set by local commissioners to:

Avoid hospital admissions where appropriate care can be provided in the community;

Early supported discharge from hospital;

Maximise independence;

Reduce dependency on longer term services.

The new contract will run until March 2018 and was awarded following an open procurement process.

Katherine has worked across community and mental health services in North West London and most recently was a commissioner at Hammersmith & Fulham CCG.

Katherine has a background in service improvement and service transformation and works hard to maximise people's independence and improving the integration of services and care to deliver what patients and carers want.

It was this purpose and the opportunity to work closely with the providers in the Tri-borough partnership that attracted Katherine to the role.

Katherine said: "I'm over the moon to have been appointed! This is a great service, doing fabulous work and I'm looking forward to meeting every staff member and our partners in local authorities. My first priority is to fill vacancies so we have a full complement from the start - and that's a challenge! We have a recruitment campaign; two physiotherapists and an occupational therapist have just joined us. We are also recruiting nurses and clinical support staff and in fact are holding an open recruitment day for health care assistants and rehabilitation assistants on 15 October."

Katherine lives in Tooting and says she is a "foodie and fitness enthusiast". She'll be joining the service fresh from her holiday hiking the Annapurna trail in Nepal.

Editors' notes

Photos show Dr Anita Logendra and Katherine Murray

Central and North West London NHS Foundation Trust
Stephenson House, 75 Hampstead Road, London NW1 2PL
Tel: 020 3214 5756 e-mail:communications.cnwl@nhs.net