Chair
Professor Joe Rafferty was appointed as Chair of The Christie NHS Foundation Trust from 1 May 2025.
Joe has over 20 years of board-level experience in NHS organisations and is passionate about fostering a culture of innovation and using data to drive strategy, planning and decision making. He also is a strong believer in creating psychologically-safe environments for staff.
Joe has spent his career working in healthcare and the NHS and was the Chief Executive of Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust until his retirement in October 2024. He transformed the organisation into one of the largest and most successful mental and community health trusts in the country during his 12 years in charge.
He also led the NIHR Mental Health Mission for the NHS that helped establish a national centre for mental health research at Liverpool University, where he is also an honorary professor, focusing on health systems.
His career spans a range of areas including performance, commissioning and strategy in provider trusts, strategic health authorities and national level roles having worked among others as CEO at NHS Central Lancashire and as an SRO at the NHS Commissioning Board Authority and executive director at NHS North West.
Joe was born and brought up in Northern Ireland, attending Queen’s University Belfast where he studied for a PhD in Molecular Genetics. Before working in the NHS, he spent 12 years in biomedical research, working in Cambridge and then at the former Paterson Institute from the late 1980s to 1999 before making the move into NHS management.
He has also extensively published in national and international healthcare journals, contributing to discussions on population health, system transformation and leadership innovation.
He was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire for services to suicide prevention in 2020.