Trust names interim CEO

A mental health trust has named a managing director as its interim chief executive while the substantive post-holder is on secondment at the local integrated care board. 

Oxford Health Foundation Trust has announced Grant Macdonald, its executive managing director for mental health, will lead the trust on an interim basis, subject to the approval of its council of governors, who meet this month. 

The trust’s CEO Nick Broughton leaves in July to take on the interim role at Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West ICB. He will be the ICB’s third CEO – and second interim – since it was established last July. HSJ understands the secondment is for 12 months. 

Mr Macdonald, who is a registered mental health nurse, has been Oxford Health’s managing director for mental health, learning disabilities and autism since March 2022. 

He has 19 years’ board-level experience, including as chief operating officer at Southern Health FT, executive director of strategy and workforce at Central and North West London FT, and executive nurse and chief operating officer at Berkshire Healthcare FT. 

Dr Broughton joined Oxford Health in 2020, and was previously chief executive at Southern Health FT and at Somerset Partnership FT.

He takes over at the ICB from current interim CEO Steve McManus, who is returning to his permanent role as Royal Berkshire FT chief executive. The ICB has not had a substantive CEO since James Kent quit last September, while its substantive chair Javed Khan went on a “period of extended leave” in April. 

Oxford Health chair David Walker said: “In Grant, Oxford Health has an accomplished executive, who brings personal experience as a nurse and as a manager in various NHS settings.”

Mr Macdonald said: “Teams make up Oxford Health and they are the most important determinant of daily work-life experience and the quality of care. Therefore, I am committed to ensuring we create the conditions for those teams to flourish and provide great care to the people we serve.”