Survival of the Fittest - Leadership for Health

Dr Paula Kilbane - biography

Chief Executive of the Eastern Health and Social Services Board, she has responsibility for commissioning a health and social care programme worth £600 million annually, for some 660,000 people living in the Greater Belfast and North and Mid-Down areas. She served as the first Director General of Co-Operation and Working Together (CAWT) - an alliance of health and social services boards from both sides of the boarder. This organisation - which secured its funding from the European Union - has successfully encouraged effective inter-boarder working on a wide range of issues including drug abuse, information technology and health promtion programmes.

Dr Kilbane is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and served on the Northern Ireland Higher Education Council, the Belfast European Partnership Board and now the Belfast Local Strategy Partnership Board. She chairs the Northern Ireland Physical Activity Implementation Group. She was awarded the CBE to health-care in the Queen's Birthday Honours List in June 2003.