Board of Trustees

We are governed by a Board of Trustees composed of 14 members, half of whom are lay members and half medical.

All Trustees are also members of The Council - an advisory body comprising of up to 30 members.

Our Trustees

Philip Yea

Chairman of The Board of Trustees and Member of Council

Philip Yea's business career has spanned both public and private companies. Philip has spent over ten years in private equity, most recently at 3i Group plc where he was Chief Executive from 2004 until January 2009, and previously at Investcorp, where his main focus was on the performance of portfolio investments.

He is the former Finance Director of Diageo, the global drinks group, where he played a key role in the creation of Diageo through Guinness's merger with GrandMet in 1997. 

Philip is a non-Executive Director of Vodafone Group Plc. He has previously been a director of Moet Hennessy, HBOS plc and Manchester United PLC. Philip is a member of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants and has a degree in Modern Languages from Oxford University.

Philip has been a Trustee since September 2008 and became Chairman of the Board of Trustees in March 2009.

Professor Sir Christopher Edwards

Trustee and Council Member

Professor Sir Christopher Edwards is the Chairman of the Chelsea & Westminster Hospital NHS Trust, a Senior Research Investigator, Experimental Physiology, Division of Medicine, Imperial College London, and Chairman of Medical Education England.

Prior to joining Chelsea and Westminster, Professor Edwards was the first Principal of Imperial College School of Medicine from 1995 to 2000 before becoming Vice-Chancellor of the University of Newcastle upon Tyne where he led a major restructuring to make it one of the top universities in the UK.

During a distinguished medical and academic career, Professor Edwards has held numerous senior positions including President of the Association of Physicians of Great Britain and Ireland and Chairman of the Council of Heads of Medical Schools.

Sir Christopher became a Trustee in May 2009. He is also Chairman of the BHF Council, and a member of the Nominations and Remuneration Committees.

Dr E Jane Flint BSc MD FRCP

Trustee and Council Member

Dr Flint qualified from Birmingham University in 1975. She has been the lead Consultant Cardiologist for the Dudley Group of Hospitals NHS Trust since 1988.

In 1988 Dr Flint was elected as the Treasurer and Chair of the British Nuclear Cardiology Group and from there she has sat on many different and varied committees.

She was elected as President of the British Association for Cardiac Rehabilitation from 1997-1999 having already been a founding member of the steering group (1992), a member of Council (1993) and President Elect (1995). She was thereby a member of the External Reference Group for the National Service Framework for CHD (2000).

More recently Dr Flint was elected as the District General Hospitals’ representative Council Member of the British Cardiac Society (2000-2004) and is currently serving a term of office as the British Cardiovascular Society’s Council Representative for Women in Cardiology. This year she has been asked to chair a British Cardiovascular Society Working Party to make recommendations for tackling Heart Disease in Women - these being our UK contribution to the European Heart Health Charter. 

Dr Flint joined the Board of Trustees and Council in July 2006.

Richard Hytner

Trustee and Council Member

Richard, a law graduate from St John’s College, Cambridge University, is Saatchi & Saatchi’s Worldwide Deputy Chairman. He joined Saatchi & Saatchi in 2003 as Chairman & CEO for Europe, Middle East and Africa, having graduated with distinction as a Sloan Fellow from London Business School. Prior to that, Richard had been UK CEO & Chairman of Publicis and Chairman of WPP’s The Henley Centre.

Richard speaks regularly to clients, conferences and business school classes around the world on leading strategic transformation; Lovemarks beyond brands; communications; and creativity. He was appointed an Executive Fellow of London Business School, attached to the Marketing Faculty, in August 2007.

Richard is chairman of Planting Promise, a sustainable educational enterprise in Sierra Leone; a founder trustee of Professor Michael Hay’s Business Bridge Initiative that provides business education to aspiring entrepreneurs around the world otherwise unable to afford it; and chairman of the British Heart Foundation’s £50 million Mending Broken Hearts Appeal.

He joined the BHF’s Board of Trustees in July 2011.

Professor Robert Lechler

Trustee and Council Member

Robert Lechler qualified in Medicine in Manchester in 1975. Thereafter, he undertook four years of junior hospital doctor training in general medicine and nephrology before embarking on a PhD in transplantation immunology at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School.

Following the PhD, he returned to full-time clinical work for two years and completed his scientific training at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, USA. He returned to the UK to a Senior Lecturer Post at the Royal Postgraduate Medical School in 1986 and became Head of the Department of Immunology in 1994.

He became Dean of Hammersmith Campus at Imperial College Faculty of Medicine in 2001 and Head of the Division of Medicine in 2003. He moved to King’s College London as Head of the School of Medicine at Guy’s, King’s College and St Thomas’ Hospitals in September 2004 and was appointed Vice Principal (Health) at  King’s College in October 2005. In June 2009 he was appointed as Executive Director of King’s Health Partners Academic Health Sciences Centre.

Professor Lechler joined the Board of Trustees and the BHF Council in July 2010.

Professor Sir Michael Marmot MBBS, MPH, PhD, FRCP, FFPHM, FMedSci

Trustee and Council Member

Director: International Institute for Society and Health

MRC Research Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health, University College London

Michael Marmot has been at the forefront of research into health inequalities for the past 30 years. 

He is Principal Investigator of the Whitehall Studies of British civil servants, investigating explanations for the striking inverse social gradient in morbidity and mortality. He leads the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) and is engaged in several international research efforts on the social determinants of health. 

He chairs the Department of Health Scientific Reference Group on tackling health inequalities and the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) Research and Development Committee. He also chairs the British Heart Foundation Primary Prevention Committee and has been a member of the BHF Council since 2000. 

He was a member of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution for six years. 

In 2000 he was knighted by Her Majesty The Queen for services to Epidemiology and understanding health inequalities. 

Internationally acclaimed, Professor Marmot is a Vice President of the Academia Europaea, a member of the RAND Health Advisory Board, a Foreign Associate Member of the Institute of Medicine and the Chair of the Commission on Social Determinants of Health set up by the World Health Organisation in 2005. He won the Balzan Prize for Epidemiology in 2004 and gave the Harveian Oration in 2006.

Professor Marmot was first elected to join the the Council and Board of Trustees in 2000.

Roger Pilgrim MA FCA

Trustee and Council Member

After graduating in Economics from Trinity College, Cambridge, Roger joined Peat Marwick (later KPMG), where he qualified as a chartered accountant. 

After qualifying, he spent two years in the US, where he was involved in audits and due diligence work mergers and acquisitions. On his return to the UK, he spent three years with KPMG before joining the private equity team of Charterhouse (now Charterhouse Capital Partners LLP) in 1987. Roger is a senior member of the investment team, which makes unquoted corporate investments.

Outside work, Roger is a keen real tennis player and amateur musician. He is also undertaking an Open University degree in humanities (focusing on History of Art). In addition to his work for the BHF, he is a member of the Campaign Council of Cambridge University and the Development Board of Somerville College, Oxford.

Roger was the Chairman of The Ranulph Fiennes Healthy Hearts Appeal, the BHF’s first ever capital appeal, and played a key role in successfully raising £2 million.

Roger is a member of the Audit and Investment Committees and became a member of Council in May 2007. He became a Trustee in 2008.

Dr Denise Pollard-Knight

Trustee and Council Member

Dr Pollard-Knight is the Managing Director for Nomura Phase4 Ventures. She has been responsible for Nomura's BioPharma investment activities since 1999 and has been a venture capitalist for over ten years.

Prior to joining Nomura Dr Pollard-Knight was an investment manager in the Bioscience Unit of Rothschild Asset Management, a unit managing over US$500 million in biotech companies in the US and Europe. Dr Pollard-Knight has held R&D management positions at Amersham and Fisons plc and was a main board Director at Scientific Generics.

Dr Pollard-Knight holds a PhD and BSc (Hons) from Birmingham University and was a Fulbright scholar at the University of California, Berkeley.  She holds a diploma in Company Direction from the Institute of Directors. Dr Pollard-Knight is a Director of Nabriva, Cerimon, Idenix and DeveloGen.

Dr Pollard-Knight is a member of the Nominations Committee and joined the Council and Board of Trustees in 2005.

John Salmon

Trustee and Council Member

John Salmon Council Member John Salmon was a senior partner in the UK firm of PricewaterhouseCoopers before his retirement. He is a chartered accountant and was admitted to the partnership of Price Waterhouse in 1976.

As well as his client responsibilities, he led the firm's services to non-executive directors of major listed companies and was Deputy Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the partnership.

He is a non-executive director of St Modwen Properties plc, a member of the advisory board of Savile plc and is also the chairman of the governors of an independent girls’ preparatory school. He is currently Chairman of the Nomination and Audit Committees, and member of the Council and Remuneration Committee.

Professor Kay-Tee Khaw CBE FRCP

Trustee and Council Member

Professor Kay-Tee Khaw is Professor of Clinical Gerontology in the University of Cambridge and Fellow of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge.

Born in Singapore, Professor Khaw studied medicine at the University of Cambridge and at St Mary's Hospital, University of London. She trained in epidemiology at the London School of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene and has held clinical and academic posts at the University of London and at the University of California, San Diego.

The focus of Professor Khaw's research interests is the maintenance of health in later life and the causes and prevention of chronic diseases including cardiovascular disease, cancer and osteoporosis.

Professor Khaw is a principal investigator in EPIC-Norfolk, part of EPIC, a prospective population study on diet, cancer and chronic disease initiated in 1992. Over 400,000 participants from ten collaborating European countries are involved in the study that aims to find out more about the long-term health of people living in the community.

Professor Khaw was awarded the CBE in the 2003 Queen's Birthday Honours List.

She became a member of both Council and the Board of Trustees in July 2006.

Professor Patrick Sissons MD FRCP FRCPath FMedSci

Trustee and Council Member

Professor Sissons is currently the Regius Professor of Physic at Cambridge University (since October 2005), succeeding Professor Sir Keith Peters.

Professor Sissons joined the University in 1988, where he established an academic division of Infectious Disease within the Department of Medicine and developed the Infectious Disease Service. In 1993 he became Head of the Department of Medicine.

Professor Sissons has served on numerous national grants committees and advisory bodies and his personal research has been supported by a UK Medical Research Council programme grant for 20 years. He was appointed a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences in 1998.

Professor Sissons joined Council in 2005 and has since become a member of the Nominations Committee.

Professor Paul M Stewart

Trustee and Council Member

Paul Stewart was born and educated in Harrogate and graduated from Edinburgh Medical School in 1982, attained MRCP in 1985 and completed his higher professional training with accreditation in Endocrinology/Diabetes Mellitus and General Internal Medicine in 1991. In 1989 he was awarded an MD from Edinburgh University with Honours and a Gold Medal. From 1992-2002 he held a MRC Senior Clinical Fellowship in Birmingham and since then has held an honorary Consultant contract with the University Hospitals Birmingham Foundation NHS Trust. In 1995 he was awarded a personal Chair in Medicine and Fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians of London and in 1999 was elected as a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences.  He is currently Dean of Medicine at the University of Birmingham.

Paul supervises an active Endocrinology research group funded currently by programme grant support from The Wellcome Trust (but also MRC, ERC, NIH and industry) that focuses on corticosteroids, specifically cortisol metabolism via 11b-hydroxysteroid dehydrogenases. His work has lead to new discoveries in hypertension, obesity, ageing and polycystic ovary syndrome and is truly translational as selective 11b-HSD1 inhibitors are in phase II development for patients with Metabolic Syndrome.

He has a major commitment to Clinical Medicine both within the NHS Trust and at National and International level. Clinical expertise includes the management of Pituitary and Adrenal disorders, Endocrine hypertension and Reproductive Medicine. Nationally, he serves or has served on Society for Endocrinology committees, Wellcome Trust Molecular and Physiological Sciences Strategy and Capital Investment committees, and is currently Chair of the MRC Clinical panel. Internationally, he has played a leadership role in the US Endocrine Society and is Secretary Treasurer for the International Society of Endocrinology.

He has over 250 original peer reviewed publications with over 13,000. He has delivered over 130 plenary/symposium lectures to specialist societies including the RCP Linacre, Goulstonian and Simms lectures, the RCP Graham Bull prize, the Society for Endocrinology Medal Lecture, the Clinical Endocrinology Trust Medal Lecture, Sir George Pickering Medal, and the Clinical Investigator Award Plenary Lecture at The Endocrine Society.

Professor Stewart joined the Board of Trustees in September 2010.

Lance Trevellyan BSc(Hons) ACA FRSA

Lance Trevellyan is founder and Chairman of the Trevellyan Group, a trading and investment group specialising in petrol retailing, fine art publishing, property investment and development and wood fuel production and marketing. He is a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants England and Wales, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts, Manufacture and Commerce and Chairman of Tilford Parish Council.

Lance joined the Board of Trustees in 2009.