Dr Sohail Munshi’s name might not yet be instantly recognisable – but his influence in Manchester is unmistakable as chief medical officer for the Manchester Local Care Organisation.
The new organisation is contracted to deliver all non-acute healthcare except core GMS contractual services to 600,000 patients under a 10-year contract worth £6bn. This was a result of the health devolution agreement reached with the Government in 2015, which gave Manchester authorities their own devolved budget.
Dr Munshi’s work has already secured him recognition from the Queen, who presented him with an MBE for ‘services to primary care and the community’ in last year’s Birthday Honours.
Describing the Manchester devolution project, Dr Munshi says ‘it is about integrating health and social care and bringing its delivery, design and governance down to a neighbourhood level’, in which he says GPs are instrumental.
He adds that it ‘represents the largest re-organisation of health and social care in any city in Europe, and possibly the world’.
Why influential: The lead clinician in Manchester’s devolved health experiment
What others say: ‘Passionate about improving the lives of people in Manchester’
Random fact: Named himself Steve Austin _ after the fictional bionic man – at primary school when teachers struggled with his Asian name
