PCDS Committee election candidate biographies (2021)

Lisa Devine

Lisa Devine graduated from University College Dublin Medical School in 2008. She worked within hospital medicine for several years before training as a GP. 

Lisa now works in the Carlton Clinic in Bray, County Wicklow, Ireland, where she has special interests in diabetes, musculoskeletal medicine and contraceptive medicine. She is a member of the East Coast Area Diabetes Committee of Ireland.

Su Down

Su Down is a Nurse Consultant in Diabetes and is the Clinical Lead for the Intermediate Diabetes Community Service in Somerset. Her diabetes nursing career began in 1989, when she set up the diabetes specialist nursing service in South Somerset. Su took up the role of Nurse Consultant in 2005 and has played a key part in redesigning and continually evolving the diabetes services across Somerset. Her role includes the delivery of an ante-natal service within one of the acute hospital trusts in Somerset. She delivers virtual clinics in both general practice and with the district nursing service hubs, and also clinically oversees an advice and guidance service. Finally, Su is co-Vice Chair of the PCDS Committee and Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Diabetes Nursing.

Patrick Holmes

Patrick Holmes has been a GP Partner at St George’s Medical Practice, Darlington (North East of England) for 23 years, with the last 14 years also spent working as the local CCG Diabetes Clinical Lead. He is a part-time GP with a Special Interest for his local foundation trust, visiting practices in the Durham and Derwentside localities. In addition to this, He is the NIHR CRN (North East) Primary Care Diabetes Research Lead and is an Associate Editor for the journal Diabetic Medicine. His clinical area of interest is the prevention and management of complications of diabetes, particularly type 2.

Patrick is active posting information on new and old data on Twitter. He invites you to follow him @drpatrickholmes.

He has taken great pleasure in being a Committee Member and Trustee for the PCDS for the past 3 years. If re-elected, he will strive to support the development of the PCDS, working with partner organisations who are also committed to the improvement in diabetes care, whoever they may be. Most importantly, he believes that the PCDS needs to “speak to power” and to petition for greater prioritisation within the health services of all the nations of Great Britain and on the Island of Ireland for both the prevention and better management of type 2 diabetes. After all, without the right resources, we can’t do the best for the people we support and treat.

David Millar-Jones

David Millar-Jones is a full-time GP in Cwmbran and has established a successful intermediate care service within the locality. He is an Associate Specialist in Diabetes and is actively involved in postgraduate teaching. This gives him a good working knowledge of secondary care, and educational needs and standards. David is also an Executive Committee Member for the Welsh Endocrine Society, whose aim is to direct the Welsh Assembly Government regarding endocrinology in Wales. 

David stands for seeking improvement in the quality of care and works to support structure and education within primary care. He believes primary care is the best arena to lead and deliver diabetes services. He is a passionate believer in patient-focused care as the way forward in diabetes management. To enable this, he feels that the majority of care should be delivered in the patient’s locality. His main work involves engagement with the diabetes community to showcase that the community setting can deliver effective and quality care, with good patient satisfaction and achievement of targets.

David was Chair of the Primary Care Diabetes Society (PCDS) between 2011 and 2018, and continues to lead its Education Subcommittee. He has been involved in writing and reviewing online learning modules. 

He remains actively involved in the implementation of the Diabetes Delivery Plan for Wales as well as in working with political and professional bodies involved in diabetes.

Nicola Milne

Nicola Milne qualified as a Registered General Nurse in 1988 and as a Midwife in 1991, moving into primary care in 2002, where she worked as a Practice Nurse for 16 years until April 2018. As a Practice Nurse, Nicola, whilst retaining a generalist role, had a special interest in diabetes, with a key focus on ensuring effective, accessible care.

Nicola is now employed by Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust as a Primary Care Diabetes Specialist Nurse, working across PCNs and within the wider community to give support and education to all health professionals in the delivery of optimal and holistic care to adults living with type 2 diabetes.

Valuing engagement and the sharing of good practice, Nicola has presented poster abstracts at PCDS, Diabetes UK and EASD conferences, and regularly delivered educational presentations at local and national diabetes conferences. She has become increasingly involved in educational activities supporting community healthcare professionals and has published multiple articles on her work. This most recently includes coauthoring national guidelines on best-practice delivery of diabetes care within the PCNs . 

Nicola was Chair of the Diabetes UK Professional Conference Organising Committee for Liverpool 2019, and is currently a Committee Member of the PCDS, a faculty member of the At the 4-Front Diabetes Nurse Leaders Academy, an Editorial Board member of Diabetes & Primary Care and the Journal of Diabetes Nursing, and was a member of the NICE Guidelines Diabetes Suite Committee until July 2021. She is also a Diabetes UK Clinical Champion.

Nicola is committed to the value of all primary healthcare professionals as first point of contact and believes that the development of all roles, in partnership with the multidisciplinary team, is crucial in supporting prevention, remission, education and excellence in diabetes care.