HealthTech Hour

Is there a healthcare system better than the NHS? And what could Britain learn from the countries getting it right? This week, Steve Roest sits down with Dr Penny Dash, Chair of NHS England, for one of the most wide-ranging conversations the show has had.
Penny began her career as a hospital doctor, went on to lead McKinsey's European healthcare practice, and now holds one of the most significant roles in global healthcare. After more than four decades in and around the system, she remains a rare voice of optimism, a realist who never sugarcoats, but always sees the potential for things to be better.
Together, Steve and Penny take a tour of the world's healthcare systems: why there's no clear "winner," what the UK still genuinely leads on, and why she believes India could become the global exemplar in healthcare by using technology to drive down the cost of care. They get into how Germany prices surgery like a market, why New Zealand and the Nordic countries are worth watching, and what the US gets wrong despite its wealth.
Closer to home, they confront the harder truths: why your GP record and hospital record are still two separate systems, why world-class electronic health records too often amount to little more than stored PDFs, and why the fight over a single patient record has echoed the same fears for thirty years. Penny also makes a provocative case that telling patients not to come to A&E gets the problem backwards and explains why nine in ten urgent cancer referrals now find nothing, and what that's doing to the system.
It's a conversation about problems, but told through the lens of what's possible and why, after 45 years, Penny is more hopeful than ever.
In this episode:
Why there's no clear winner among global healthcare systems, and what the UK still leads on
Why Dr Dash believes India could lead the world in healthcare
How Germany prices surgery like a market to manage waiting lists
Why your GP and hospital records still don't connect
The single patient record debate, and thirty years of the same resistance
Why "don't come to A&E" is the wrong message
Why most urgent cancer referrals now find nothing
🎧 New episodes every week with the founders, clinicians, journalists and leaders shaping the future of healthcare.

Matthew Whitty is the former Director of Innovation, Research and Life Sciences at NHS England and now Director of Commercial Partnerships at MDClone, a global healthcare data platform. Combining senior NHS leadership with frontline experience in healthcare data and AI, he is an expert on NHS data strategy, safe AI adoption and how health systems can unlock the value of data while protecting patiWho actually owns your health data? Most people assume there's a single patient record sitting somewhere in the NHS. There isn't, and that gap sits at the heart of one of healthcare's most important and least understood debates.
This week, Steve Roest is joined by Matthew Whitty, Director of Commercial Partnerships at MDClone and former Director of Innovation, Research and Life Sciences at NHS England. Drawing on a career that's spanned hospital pharmacy, commissioning, consultancy and national policy, Matt offers a rare view from the intersection of government, industry, academia and patient care.
Together they unpack why the "privatisation" debate is really about trust and motivation, what the Federated Data Platform and the Palantir contract actually involve, and why de-identified data can still put patients at risk - including the recent UK Biobank breach. They also explore synthetic data, the case for sandbox environments that could make Britain the number one place to build healthtech, and why Matt believes there's far more reason for optimism about the NHS than the headlines suggest.
In this episode:
Why the NHS can't build everything itself, and what the private-sector "tension" is really about
Who owns your health data, and why no single patient record exists
The Federated Data Platform and Palantir controversy, explained
How de-identified data gets re-identified, and what happened with UK Biobank
Synthetic data and the case for UK healthtech "sandboxes"
Why the NHS may compare far better to other systems than people assume
🎧 New episodes every week with the founders, clinicians, journalists and leaders shaping the future of healthcare.ent privacy.

What would meaningful NHS reform actually look like—and why is it so difficult to discuss?
In this episode of Health Tech Hour, Steve Roest speaks with veteran health journalist Paul Gallagher about the pressures facing the NHS, including waiting-list backlogs, workforce shortages, delayed hospital discharges, social-care gaps and the political sensitivity surrounding reform.
Paul draws on two decades of healthcare reporting to examine why the NHS repeatedly falls into short-term crisis management, how public expectations compare with the amount the UK is willing to spend, and why discussions about restructuring are so often reduced to fears of privatisation.
The conversation also explores the role technology can play in moving care from hospitals into communities, improving prevention and making services easier to access. Steve shares how a single SMS offering an at-home health check generated 80% uptake among previously unresponsive patients, illustrating how service design, not patient apathy, can determine engagement.
They discuss:
Why social-care shortages keep medically fit patients in hospital
How fragmented care and workforce vacancies create system-wide delays
Whether technology can meaningfully reduce pressure on NHS staff
Why convenience matters for preventative-health participation
The difference between private delivery and charging patients
Why NHS reform debates often default to comparisons with the US
What the UK could learn from healthcare systems in Europe and Japan
Whether higher taxation could support better public services
How politics and the media reinforce short-term decision-making
Paul Gallagher is a health journalist with more than 20 years of experience, including a decade as health correspondent at the i Paper and work for publications including The Times, The Telegraph and The Mirror. He is also contributing to an Alzheimer’s Disease International report focused on clinical trials.
Health Tech Hour features the founders, clinicians, journalists and system leaders changing healthcare in the UK and beyond.

The NHS has invested billions in digital records - but what if the real breakthrough isn't more software, it's what sits on top?
In this episode of HealthTech Hour, Tom shares how a naval architecture degree and a chance consultancy project peeling onions for Domino's Pizza led him to co-found DrDoctor in 2012 - and why 13 years later, he believes outpatient care as we know it shouldn't exist.
We explore:
why hospital appointments haven't fundamentally changed since the 1600s, how DrDoctor has powered nearly 200 million NHS appointments for 37 million patients, why 40% of outpatient activity could be delivered at home, how agentic AI is now transforming how patients interact with the NHS, why EPRs alone don't deliver the savings the NHS was promised, the shift from digitisation to optimisation in NHS strategy, why every CEO of a software business needs to embrace AI, the paradox of the most-wanted job being a doctor while most doctors want to leave, how UK health tech founders can build lasting relationships with the NHS
Tom also explains how DrDoctor is becoming the agentic operating system for the NHS — integrating deeply with EPRs, powering the NHS App, and building the AI tools that free up clinicians to focus on patient care.
Whether you're a healthcare professional, founder, investor, policymaker, or simply interested in the future of healthcare, this conversation offers a rare inside view of what really needs to change to make the NHS fit for the future.
#HealthTech #DigitalHealth

The NHS needs thousands more GPs - but what if the solution isn't training more doctors, but reconnecting qualified clinicians already outside the workforce?
In this episode of HealthTech Hour, Julian shares how a personal diagnosis of a bicuspid aortic valve sparked his journey into healthcare and why he believes preventative care should be far more accessible.
We explore:
why the NHS workforce crisis continues to worsen, why thousands of GPs are leaving the profession, how remote UK-qualified doctors can support primary care, the future of global healthcare workforces, why AI won't replace doctors anytime soon, the challenges of building healthtech companies in the UK, the role of prevention in reducing long-term healthcare costs, what the NHS 10-Year Plan means for healthcare innovation
Julian also explains how Asterix Health is helping GP practices manage complex clinical workloads, reduce administrative burden, and improve patient care by reconnecting experienced doctors with the healthcare system.
Whether you're a healthcare professional, founder, investor, policymaker, or simply interested in the future of healthcare, this conversation offers a fascinating look at one of the biggest challenges facing health systems today.
#HealthTech #DigitalHealth