Begyndte sin karriere som fuldmægtig i amtsrådsforeningen. Derefter fik han lederposter i Ringkøbing Amt og efterfølgende Nordjyllands Amt, hvor Per Okkels startede som sundhedsdirektør og senere blev amtsdirektør. Han har en bred og mangeårig erfaring inden for det regionale område, sundhedsområdet, det sociale område, psykiatrien, børne- og ungeområdet, EU-området samt løn- og personaleområdet. Senest har Per Okkels stået i spidsen for omstillingen fra Nordjyllands Amt til Region Nordjylland, og han har stået i spidsen for udviklingen af en ny sygehusstruktur, en regional udviklingsplan samt forbedret kræftbehandling. Han har været administrerende direktør for Danske Regioner siden marts 2008.

Uddannet ved Aarhus Universitet. Han er speciallæge i kardiologi, civiløkonom HD i organisation og har en Master in Health management (MHM). Herudover har han en Ph.D grad i sundhedsvidenskab, kardiologi. Han var i perioden 2007 – 2010 lægefaglig direktør på Sygehus Sønderjylland og har siden 1. januar været direktør for Odense Universitetshospital, hvor han bl.a. har ansvar for kræft og hjerte/kar området, kirurgien, lægemiddelområdet samt forskning og de højt specialiserede funktioner.

He is on secondment from his academic post as an Honorary Consultant in Oral Surgery at the University of Glasgow Dental School in Scotland. He was a 2005-06 Quality Improvement Fellow at the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, in Boston, sponsored by the Health Foundation. Jason is also a trustee of the UK wing of the Indian Rural Evangelical Fellowship which runs orphanages in southeast India. He has a doctorate from the University of Glasgow, an MPH from Harvard and is a fellow of the Royal College of Surgeons of England, The Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow and the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh.  He is also a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. He chairs the Conduct and Health Committees of the General Dental Council, the regulatory body for dentistry in the UK.

Danny Sands is senior medical informatics director for Cisco, where he provides both internal and external health IT leadership and helps key customers with business and clinical transformation using IT. His prior position was chief medical officer for Zix Corporation, a leader in secure e-mail and e-prescribing, and before that he spent 13 years at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, where he developed and implemented numerous systems to improve clinical care delivery and patient engagement.
He has earned degrees from Brown University, Ohio State University, Harvard School of Public Health, and trained at Boston City Hospital and Boston’s Beth Israel Hospital.  Dr. Sands currently holds an academic appointment at Harvard Medical School and maintains a primary care practice in which he makes extensive use of health IT.
Sands is the recipient of numerous health IT awards, has been elected to fellowship in both the American College of Physicians and the American College of Medical Informatics, and is a founder and board member of the Society for Participatory Medicine.  In 2009 he was recognized by HealthLeaders Magazine as one of “20 People Who Make Healthcare Better.”

A member of the team responsible for developing innovative designs in patient care. She leads the IHI portfolio of patient safety programmes in the United Kingdom and Europe. She developed and led The Health Foundation sponsored Safer Patients Initiative One and Two and currently leads the IHI team developing The Safer Patients Network, a three-year project to improve patient safety in the UK.  She also leads the IHI team in the transformation of country-wide patient safety in acute care in Scotland and Denmark. She serves as the IHI advisor on safety programme development with the NHS Institute. She is the executive lead for the Patient Safety Executive Training Program. She has been a dean in higher education, a clinician, consultant and researcher.
 
Dr. Haraden has published several papers on measuring patient harm, improving intensive care outcomes and innovation in heath care design. She recently served on the Institute of Medicine Committee, Engineering Approaches to Improve Health Care. She is a judge for several national quality awards including the Quest for Quality Award sponsored by the AHA and the John Eisenberg Award for Patient Safety and Quality sponsored by the JCAHO. She has served on AHRQ study sections and is a member of the JCAHO Sentinel Event Advisory Committee.  She is an associate editor for the journal, Quality and Safety in Health Care.

“e-Patient Dave” deBronkart was diagnosed in January 2007 with Stage IV, Grade 4 renal cell carcinoma (kidney cancer) at a very late stage. His median survival time at diagnosis was just 24 weeks; with tumors in both lungs, several bones, and muscle tissue, his prognosis was “grim,” as one web site described it. He received great treatment at Boston’s Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center: his surgeon removed the extensive mess (laparoscopically!), and the Biologic Therapy program helped him participate in a clinical trial for the powerful but severe High Dosage Interleukin-2 (HDIL-2). His last treatment was July 23, 2007, and by September it was clear he’d beaten the disease. His remaining lesions have continued to shrink.