HomeOur approach

Our approach

One of the big questions in health prevention has always been: How can we help people make changes that last a lifetime?

The answers have become clearer thanks to clinical research, behaviour change theory, and data analysis.

Since 2015, we’ve been applying our evidence-based approach in a personalised way with outstanding results, using our own data and the latest research to constantly improve – and help people live healthier lives.

We work with...

We work with both public service commissioners and employers to create health solutions for their communities or workplaces.

Commissioners

Commission a bespoke, person-centred service that meets the needs of your community, maximising engagement and health outcomes.

Employers

Support that helps individuals, teams, and entire organisations become healthier, happier and more resilient.

Evidence-based quality assurance

We manage clinical governance through our robust Clinical Governance Framework. This ensures effective, safe delivery across all our services.

Our framework draws on the experience of in-house experts in psychology, nutrition, physical activity and other lifestyle risk factors. Our experts provide quality assurance across all our interventions, which are data-led and outcome-driven.

All our services and products are underpinned by proven behaviour change best practice, theory and techniques. They comply with:

NICE and Office for Health Improvement and Disparities guidelines
NICE PH49 patient-centred principles
NICE PH53 guidelines for weight management
NICE NG209 guidelines on tobacco
COM-B Behaviour Change Framework
NCSCT (National Centre for Smoking Cessation and Training) research

Alongside this, a robust cycle of clinical governance, risk management, data analysis, product development, and acting on participant feedback, supports our continuous improvement approach and means we never stop learning, adapting and improving.

However, there is no ‘off-the-shelf’ solution when it comes to health.

The real power of our approach is the way we can tailor services to motivate and inspire the real people that are using them. This is what delivers lasting change.

Meet our highly skilled Clinical Excellence Team

Marina heads up the Clinical Excellence Team, ensuring quality services for our clients, participants and patients through robust clinical oversight. She leads her team and external consultants to develop and deliver the necessary specialist clinical aspects and meeting of the requirements of the Clinical Governance Framework. As well as leading her team Marina also undertakes the role of Caldicott Guardian within Reed Wellbeing.

Marina is a Senior Clinician and proud to be a Registered Nurse with over thirty years’ experience in healthcare, regulatory and customer service organisations.

Marina’s career started in her local general hospital, training and then specialising in Surgical Nursing. Since then she has worked for Bupa Insurance (care services), the General Medical Council, Primary Care Services England, and before moving to work for Reed Wellbeing she was the National Clinical Lead & Head Nurse at Livability UK.

At home Marina enjoys spending time with her family and friends, running (rather badly!), watching sci-fi movies and dramas, and household DIY.

Danny is from the West Midlands but has been nomadic while completing his qualifications and starting his career in public health.

Danny has always been a sports lover from childhood and represented his Worcestershire County teams for both rugby union and hockey. While attending university, Danny completed his undergraduate degree in sports science at Bangor University where he was regularly in and around the Snowdonia National Park, spending time in the beautiful countryside, before moving to Chester to complete his MSc in Nutrition and Exercise Science.

After this, Danny started his career in healthy lifestyle services; working in services that included child weight management, adult weight management, physical activity, smoking cessation, health check programs, social isolation and falls prevention. During his working life he’s worked as a practitioner, as well as managing services and training other health professionals - his passion being the improvement of services to reduce health inequalities.

In his spare time, Danny loves good food and exercise. He enjoys cooking new dishes, and in October 2021 he completed his first marathon with plans to complete a long-distance triathlon soon.

Jason joined Reed in Partnership in Oct 2020 on the JETS programme as a Health and Wellbeing Adviser and later moved to Reed Wellbeing to work on the Restart Scheme service as a Wellbeing for Work Coach. Before joining Clinical Excellence, Jason was a Wellbeing Coach Manager on the One You Leeds service. Now Jason works within the Clinical Excellence team as a Health Improvement Lead. Jason takes great pride in the provision of clinical support across all contracts, which includes provision of training, research and review of clinical guidelines, policy and process updates, and supporting with clinical incidents. Jason is passionate about providing safe and effective service for participants, commissioners and the wider communities as well as Reed co-members.

Jason enjoys lots of various sports, mainly just watching now, but did play football and golf in his younger days. Jason tries to be as active as he can, lifting weights at the gym several days per week and going for a run. Jason likes to spend his weekends going for nice walks in the countryside with a cheeky pub stop, good food and spending time with friends and family, when he can go visit them in Ireland.

Julia started her career as a Nursing Assistant for the NHS, supporting the Rehabilitation of Outpatients. Keen to develop her skillset and make a greater impact towards the provision of healthcare, she went on to complete an undergraduate degree in Psychology, later choosing to major in Mental Health.

From there, Julia’s passion for making a difference grew and led her to work in psychiatric care, where she developed experience in dementia care, personality, mood and eating disorders, psychosis, trauma, learning disabilities and substance misuse.

Having established a strong background in providing psychosocial support for a range of conditions, Julia returned to study a master’s in research psychology, where she developed a computer programme for cognitive bias modification aimed at supporting individuals with Autism.

Upon completion of the course, Julia was offered a position facilitating the NHS ‘REFOCUS’ project for Gloucestershire, aimed at making community-based adult mental health services in England more recovery-oriented. More recently, Julia has completed a PgCert in Cognitive Behavioural Psychotherapy and spent time as a skills trainer dedicated to helping remove barriers to employment and wellbeing.

Julia is passionate about evidence-based practice and follows the 5-ways to wellbeing as part of her own health improvement. She hopes to inspire others by demonstrating healthy practice and working in collaboration with the Reed Wellbeing service. In her spare time, Julia enjoys running and competes as part of a sports team. She is currently

learning British Sign Language and is a volunteer ‘Ask Me’ ambassador for Women’s Aid supporting Men and Women experiencing domestic abuse.

Laura started her career with a passion for teaching and education, however, after developing a keen interest in population health management and behaviour change, Laura began a Masters in Health Psychology.

With her research focusing on nutrition and twins, Laura learnt the influence of life events on health, leading to her work in hospitals and communities across Berkshire in the eating disorders service. Recognising the benefit that digital can bring to improve health, Laura then moved to the South West, to begin a role supporting clinicians nationwide to deliver digital solutions and apps, to aid the patient population with managing their chronic health conditions.

Laura's passion for behaviour change and health improvement lead to her current venture completing a Doctorate in Health Psychology, specialising in women's health and body image. This coincided with her role managing a team of Behaviour Change Practitioners, delivering health behaviour change interventions in weight management, exercise, smoking and alcohol reduction. Now in her current role as Health Improvement Lead, Laura also leads support groups at Endometriosis UK and supports the Institute of Optimum Nutrition with research supervision and lecturing.

In her spare time, Laura enjoys making the most of the South Coast, running, paddleboarding and enjoying all the good food Dorset has to offer.

Natasha first joined the Reed Group in October 2020 as a Health and Wellbeing Adviser on a service for jobseekers, before then making the move to Reed Wellbeing as a Wellbeing for Work Coach after a year. Natasha eventually became a Coach Manager on the same programme before securing the position as a Health Improvement Lead (seconded) within the Clinical Excellence Team.

Prior to joining Reed, Natasha studied Psychology at university, and did her dissertation around how our mental health impacts our memories of past events, as well as our perception of future events. Natasha has volunteered for a local charity near to her hometown, which supported people living with mental ill health. She also volunteered for the crisis support line SHOUT- aimed at supporting people in crisis.

In her free time, Natasha enjoys going to gym classes, going out for good food and baking.

Lesa joined Reed Wellbeing as Clinical Quality Assurance Lead after working within another Division within Reed in Partnership for almost eight years. Her experience was gained within the Employability Division. Prior to joining the Reed Group Lesa was employed in positions within social care and education.

Her passion for quality assurance, audit and compliance has led Lesa to her latest role and the chief responsibilities for ensuring that all services delivered by Reed Wellbeing are delivered to the highest clinical quality standards and that we maintain the highest levels of clinical effectiveness. Lesa has a real drive and desire to not only ensure our services continue to be delivered to the very highest quality but also that they remain clinically safe and effective for participants. Lesa brings a wealth of experience in quality management, continuous improvement and audit and compliance processes and implementation.

Lesa has lived experience, indeed through her own first-hand encounters she has witnessed Reed Wellbeing changing lives for the better and how Reed Wellbeing services have a positive impact on individuals, their families and the wider community.

In her spare time, Lesa enjoys retail therapy, spending time with her family and taking her black lab, Jaida for walks (although Jaida tends to take Lesa for walks!).

Colin grew up in North Liverpool before moving to Leeds to study medicine, where he still lives. After completing training as a GP in 2009, he practised in the Wakefield district of West Yorkshire. He’s a strong believer in creating empowered teams and developing people. A desire to contribute to the future of the profession led to him studying adult education theory and its application to primary care settings in Leeds university and becoming a trainer of junior doctors to become GP’s.

Pursuing an interest in diabetes care, he undertook further training and led on planning and improving diabetes care in Wakefield district alongside secondary care colleagues. He moved on to apply his experience and interest in quality improvement, clinical safety and people development to the ongoing development of primary care and its integration into care provision as part of Integrated Care Systems as the Executive Health Care Advisor to Wakefield CCG. He believes digital transformation and access to the correct tools will empower citizens and professionals to transparently work together to personalise the health and wellbeing needs of us all.

Colin is father to two, plus an excitable cockapoo. He volunteers his time to support a local primary school as Chair of Governors. He enjoys sci-fi and fantasy across books and video. Like many others he enjoys good food and exercise, but doesn’t always get the balance correct.

After qualifying as a dietitian, Mary’s first dietetic post was at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge. She moved back to Leeds in 1983, to become a Metabolic Dietitian, with a large focus on obesity.

Leeds was one of the few hospitals with medical obesity and bariatric surgery services at that time. Mary was instrumental in developing the dietetic service to patients with severe and complex obesity, and working with other dietitians nationally to develop resources and training courses. She was appointed Consultant Dietitian in Adult Obesity and led the obesity multidisciplinary team.

Mary has served on many national committees, including the British Nutrition Foundation Obesity Task Force, NICE Obesity Clinical Guidelines (2006, 2014), NHS England Obesity Clinical Reference Group, and British Obesity and Metabolic Surgery Society (BOMSS). She has led working groups developing the BOMSS nutritional guidelines and long term follow up guidelines. She sits on the Executive Board of the International Federation of the Surgery of Obesity and Metabolic Disorders and chairs its Integrated Health Committee. She is a Trustee of the Association for the Study of Obesity, and a committee member of the British Dietetic Association (BDA) Obesity Specialist Group. Mary continues to be active in education and training, research and supporting patients with severe and complex obesity.

In 2016, Mary was made a Fellow of the BDA in recognition of her services to dietetics. She received the BDA Elizabeth Washington award in 2017 and 2021 for the leading the development of national guidelines, and the education around them.

Mary stepped back from her NHS role to allow her to commit to other obesity related activities, however, she remains an Honorary Consultant Dietitian (Adult Obesity) with Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust.

Mary enjoys swimming, trying to improve her violin playing, eating out and travelling.

Nearing the end of her Doctorate in Clinical Psychology at the University of Oxford, Emma was due to go on a placement abroad. Not wanting to miss out on a job due to being away, she took the first local Clinical Psychologist role that came up and entered the world of Weight Management. Whilst this had not been a career aspiration, partly due to the lack of teaching in this area and lack of psychological input into Weight Management Services at that time, she has never looked back.

Emma has worked in both Tier 3 and Tier 4 Weight Management Services (lifestyle treatments and bariatric surgery) with a brief flirtation in Diabetes Services in a couple of London Hospitals. She has made her home in the Midlands and works part-time for a local NHS Weight Management Service and is also an Associate Clinical Psychologist with a private bariatric surgery company in the South of England. She is a seasoned speaker at conferences, provides teaching to local health courses and contribute to research projects.

Emma has significant experience designing and implementing the psychological provision of weight management services, working clinically in groups and with individuals and supporting multidisciplinary working. She draws from a range of psychological approaches and uses her extensive clinical skills to explore the psychological drivers and impact of weight management difficulties to support people to find solutions, consider treatment options and move towards a more positive future.

Emma currently sits on two national committees: the British Obesity and Metabolic Surgery Society (BOMSS) and the British Psychological Society’s (BPS) Obesity Special Interest Group. She is incredibly passionate about using her experience and platforms to challenge weight stigma and support the development of more effective, compassion care for people living in larger bodies and those with health conditions.

Emma tries to practice at least a little of what she ‘preaches’ and makes time for keeping active with yoga, running and throwing kettlebells around. She even enjoys reading and sewing quilts when the demands of working and caring for two young children allow.