- This event has passed.
Talk by Dr Rupert Whitaker OBE – Runcorn
23 October 2024 @ 2:00 pm - 3:00 pm
Free
Inspirational talk by Dr. Rupert Whitaker OBE. Dr. Whitaker is a renowned speaker, healthcare pioneer, and co-founder of the Terrence Higgins Trust, who has dedicated his career to advancing public health and advocating for people living with HIV.
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/976311182027
Dr. Whitaker’s talk will cover his remarkable journey, the challenges he has faced, and his vision for the future of public health and community support. His insights and experiences promise to be both moving and motivating, offering valuable lessons for all of us working towards a healthier and more inclusive society.
Bio
Dr. Rupert Whitaker OBE
Chairman, Tuke Institute; Public Speaker; Consultant in Psychological Medicine and Public Health
Valorem7 University of California, San Francisco – School of Medicine
United Kingdom
About
When I’m asked what I do, I reply that, though I’m a senior clinician and scientist, my real expertise comes from my extensive experience as a patient. Over the last 40 years I’ve been treated for HIV, a stroke, a heart-attack, cancer, major depression, and, following brain-surgery, epilepsy. On three occasions I’ve been given less than six months to live, but with a potent mix of skill, determination, and luck, I’m still here.
That combination of expertise and patient-experience has created a deep insight that informs my work advising health-services on how to help patients get well and stay well. I’ve been a staunch advocate for people with terminal and chronic illness since the death of my partner Terry from AIDS when I was 19; I then co-founded the Terrence Higgins Trust, Europe’s first and now leading HIV and sexual health charity. Afterwards, I trained for 14 years in biobehavioural medicine and science, eventually becoming an expert medical witness internationally, and having over 80 publications, most as first author.
Later, ��I founded the Tuke Institute to challenge medical services to stop simply prescribing pills and waving patients out a revolving door, and instead to help us get well and stay well, moving from an expensive, physician-centred disease-service to an effective, patient-centred health-service, with (safe) public and patient participation as a keystone. One of my most valued skills is translating complex issues into measurable solutions, pulling apart the traditional and re-forming it into something that’s not just workable, but works for every patient. When you work from the patient outwards, solutions look very different — and become far more effective. Finding creative solutions means overturning the assumed and joining up the pieces in a brand new way. It’s not rocket-science but advanced health-science informed by clinical expertise and very hard-won, lived experience.
Media-activities: since 1983, I have been a focus of over 40 profiles and TV programmes on HIV and public health, including a 2011 profile in the Guardian newspaper (UK) and a 1992 televised debate on the McNeil-Lehrer News Hour (US) with Assistant US Secretary of State for Health and Human Services Philip Lee and Republican Senator William Dannemeyer on health-related immigration-policy.
We believe your presence at this event would greatly enrich the discussion and contribute to our shared goals. Your support and engagement are crucial in making this event a success and fostering stronger community ties.
Please confirm your attendance by 1st of October 2024.
Should you have any questions or require further information, do not hesitate to contact us at Northwest HIV Support CIC 07488227331
