I am currently the President of the IBMS, having taken up the role on 1st January 2024. In addition, I am the network lead for Blood Sciences at the Scarborough, Hull, York Pathology Service, responsible for managing blood sciences across 4 hospitals.
Nigel Coles is a Fellow of the Institute of Biomedical Science and a Chartered Scientist, recently retired from a 34 year career at Birmingham Women’s and Children's NHS Foundation Trust. For the last 16 Nigel acted as a Quality Manager and Clinical Governance lead for the Genetics and Pathology Directorate. Beforehand he was Head Biomedical Scientist specialising in Neonatal and Maternity Clinical Biochemistry.
Nigel has 44 years NHS experience as a Biomedical Scientist. In 1985 he qualified as a Fellow of the Institute of Biomedical Science and has since worked in many roles including the role of Head Biomedical Scientist in Clinical Chemistry at Birmingham Women's Hospital.
Nigel was the IBMS Council member for 9 years and remains on the IBMC Council acting as their Honorary Treasurer. Nigel is also Deputy Chair of the IBMS Specialist Advisory Panel Quality Management Committee.
He is also a director of the Association of Quality Managers in Laboratory Medicine (AQMLM) and a Specialist Laboratory Advisor to the CQC.
Jennifer is Laboratory Manager at Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust with 39 years’ experience in Biomedical Science. She leads microbiology and virology services, managing a team of around 110 staff who deliver 1.6 million tests annually. An active member of the Institute of Biomedical Science (IBMS) since 2011, Jennifer represents the North East on Council and chairs the Membership & Marketing Committee. Her previous roles include Deputy Chief Examiner for the Higher Specialist Diploma and membership of the Microbiology Specialist Advisory Panel. She regularly contributes to IBMS Congress and advises on standards, training, and emerging technologies. Passionate about sustainability, Jennifer is part of the Newcastle Integrated Laboratory Medicine Sustainability Committee and the NENC Pathology Alliance Specialist Reference Group. She champions initiatives to reduce carbon footprint and waste, focusing on minimizing single-use plastics and inspiring staff to adopt greener practices.
My name is Bir-Inder Ironmonger. I am a pathology professional with extensive experience working in and leading NHS laboratory services. I have previously worked as Head Biomedical Scientist at Russells Hall Hospital in the West Midlands and Lead Scientist at The Royal Shrewsbury & Telford Hospital in Shropshire , where I focused on supporting staff, delivering safe and high-quality services, and fostering a positive team culture.
I am now supporting Birmingham and Solihull Pathology on its network journey, working collaboratively across organisations to help shape strategy, develop the workforce, and strengthen system working. My values centre on integrity, kindness, inclusivity, and continuous improvement. I believe strongly in developing people, listening to frontline voices, and building trusted relationships to create resilient pathology services that put patients, staff wellbeing, and quality at the heart of everything we do.
BEng (Hons) MSc MBA LLM CEng FIMechE FIBMS (Hon)
Karin has been the Chief Executive of the Northern Ireland Blood Transfusion Service since 2016. NIBTS supplies blood and components to the health service in Northern Ireland, tests all antenatal blood samples and is the reference laboratory for the region.
Following a manufacturing engineering career with Ford Motor Company in Belfast and Wales, Karin joined the health service in 2002 undertaking a number of operational roles with responsibility for local and regional adult and paediatric services including the largest emergency department in Northern Ireland, the regional children’s hospital as well as the regional assisted conception unit based at the Belfast Health and Social Care Trust.
Karin is Programme Director for the NI Pathology Blueprint Programme, SRO for two regional digital projects (coreLIMS and Blood Production & Tracking) and Deputy Chair of the NI Pathology Network.
Angela is an award winning healthcare operations leader with over 25 years’ senior management experience in pathology, progressing from Biomedical Scientist to Managing Director. She has a proven track record in operational excellence, pathology service transformation, operating model design and performance delivery across the London 1 network. Recognised for advancing clinical governance, patient safety, quality and financial sustainability whilst building resilient services and workforce capability. She is a trusted educator and standards leader within Biomedical Science, with long standing contributions to the Institute of Biomedical Science and the field of Immunology diagnostics.
Suchita Joshi is the National Head of Pathology at NHS England, with a career spanning biomedical science, service transformation, and national healthcare policy. She is a qualified histopathology biomedical scientist with specialist training in paediatric and perinatal pathology at Cambridge University Hospitals. Early in her career, she gained broad hands-on experience across pathology services at St Thomas’ Hospital, complementing her professional training and grounding her leadership in frontline practice.
Her career has encompassed work in mortuary services, leadership of histopathology laboratories within the independent sector, and programme leadership for urological cancer pathways at the West London Cancer Alliance, where she implemented the Rapid Access to Prostate Imaging and Diagnostics (RAPID) pathway. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Suchita served as a Senior Policy Advisor in NHS England’s Testing Cell, contributing to the rapid expansion of national testing capability.
In her current role, she leads national efforts to improve equity, innovation, and sustainability in pathology services, while championing the pathology workforce and its vital role in patient care. She is committed to ensuring pathology services are prioritised for modernisation and recognised as leaders of system-wide change. www.linkedin.com/in/suchita-joshi-a410b111a
Sarah May is the former Deputy Chief Executive of the IBMS, now retired but retained as a biomedical science consultant. She has extensive experience of biomedical science and has worked on many of the IBMS's key projects in relation to education, training and advanced biomedical science practice.
I am a Senior Project Manager within the NHS Wales Performance & Improvement, working as part of the National Pathology Programme. I have over 18 years’ experience across NHS and private healthcare, with a strong background in pathology services, workforce transformation, education and training, and national service improvement programmes.
I currently lead on several all-Wales initiatives, including the development of the national pathology benchmarking frameworks and the Pathology Practice Education Facilitator (PPEF) pilot, aimed at strengthening workforce sustainability and training capacity. I have previously held senior laboratory, operational, and industry roles, which have provided me with a broad system-wide perspective across diagnostics.
I am particularly interested in service resilience, workforce planning, education innovation, and data-driven improvement at scale.
Brian is a Life Member of the Institute of Biomedical Science (IBMS). He undertook initial multidisciplinary biomedical science training in Cheltenham, then specialised in histopathology and cytology. In 1975 he was appointed Chief Biomedical Scientist and laboratory manager in Hereford. An interest in education resulted in increasing involvement in biomedical science publishing, which included working with the National Association of Cytologists as Editor of SCAN, and with the IBMS as Editor of the British Journal of Biomedical Science (BJBS), while still a practising biomedical scientist. After leaving the NHS in 2001, Brian took on the full-time professional editorial stewardship of The Biomedical Scientist and BJBS, and Step Communications’ publication Pathology in Practice. Currently, Brian is Science Editor at Pathology in Practice, and Editorial Specialist Advisor and Chair of the History Committee at the IBMS.
Sarah Pitt is a Principal Lecturer at Brighton University, UK where she teaches microbiology and biomedical science professional practice. She has a BSc in Microbiology (Bristol University), an MSc in Applied Parasitology and Medical Entomology (Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine) and a PhD from Liverpool John Moores University. She is registered with the Health and Care Professions Council as a Biomedical Scientist, specialising in virology. Before taking up a full time academic post, Sarah worked in diagnostic pathology laboratories in the UK, Zimbabwe and Tajikistan, with a particular emphasis on training. She is Fellow of the Institute of Biomedical Science and was an examiner for the IBMS professional qualifications in Virology for 20 years. She was elected to be a member of the governing IBMS Council in 2021. Sarah has a national and international media profile commenting on infectious diseases and in the last 5 years she has conducted over 110 TV interviews, over 900 radio interviews and worked with journalists on written pieces. She has authored 3 textbooks and over 40 scientific articles. She was awarded Life Membership of the IBMS in 2021, an Advancing Healthcare Science Award in 2021 and Honorary Fellowship of the Academy of Healthcare Science in 2022. She is currently the President of the Institute of Biomedical Science.
My career in Microbiology began as a trainee MLSO in the NHS in 1984. After several enjoyable years I changed my path and moved in to the commercial sector with GIBCO BRL as a technical representative and progressed to business development management for Europe and the Nordics. In 1989 I took up a challenging opportunity and co-founded Pro-Lab Diagnostics in the UK. Over 34 years now, Pro-lab Diagnostics has grown considerably throughout the world offering a continually expanding range of innovative diagnostic kits and reagents for Microbiology, Immunology and Virology, and laboratory automation. Progress and support have always been core values for myself and all at Pro-Lab Diagnostics where we strive to support the clinical care pathway in Microbiology with close working ties with all laboratories, academic institutes, and research institutes. Core to our success and responsibility are strong relationships with many governing, advisory bodies and societies including of course the IBMS and BIVDA where we contribute regularly. I am proud to have been the Chairman of the IBMS Company members for many years and also hold a position on the BIVDA Executive Board. Engagement with academia and career development is also a key responsibility in our company ethos.
No one will ever forget the impact that the COVID pandemic had on the world, and the dedication of all health workers, especially in the laboratory, will always be remembered. The following link video made for TV offers a little more insight in to who we are at Pro-Lab Diagnostics
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otc6f-ta2kQ
To be involved in the judging panel for the IBMS awards is privilege.
[email protected] http://www.pro-lab.co.uk
I have worked as a practicing biomedical scientist in the clinical histopathology laboratories of London hospital medical schools for nearly 20 years, to include over 10 years as a UK NEQAS manager at UCL. I have also worked in academia for over 20 years, as a Professor in Biomedical Research at UWE in Bristol and more recently in the Dept of Pathology at the University of Malaya Medical Centre, in Kuala Lumpur, in addition to Professorial appointments at Taylor's University and the International Medical University in Kuala Lumpur. I am currently the Editor-in-Chief of the British Journal of Biomedical Science and also work closely with friends and colleagues in Vietnam in the area of quality assurance of pathology and laboratory medicine.
Gordon Sutehall is a retired virologist from Cambridge UK. He was employed by the (then) Public Health England and was Head of Quality and Governance Lead for PHE Microbiology Services. Gordon served on the Council of the IBMS for many years and was elected President for 2006-7. He remains an assessor for the Institute and the Science Council.