Max Robinson
Consultant pathologist
Max provides specialist head and neck pathology services at Newcastle Hospitals. He is the Human Tissue Authority designated individual for the research sector and clinical lead for NovoPath. Max’s role on the Biobank Access Committee is to ensure applications comply with the conditions of the HTA licence and follow the HTA Codes of Practice and Standards.
John Tyson
Head of Innovation Lab
John has overall responsibility for the operations of the North East Innovation Lab, ensuring strong partnerships with industry, academia and the NHS, working closely with Newcastle Hospitals’ senior management and clinical teams. John’s knowledge and expertise are invaluable when reviewing applications put to the Biobank Access Committee.
Chris Kettle
NovoPath Operations Manager
As Operations Manager for NovoPath, Chris is a member of the Biobank Access Committee.
Donna Nile
Newcastle Hospitals Biobank manager
Beginning as a senior scientist within the North East Innovation Lab, Donna’s main role is managing the biobank. Donna looks after all sample access requests, ensuring their timely review by our Biobank Access Committee, and ensures all biobanking activities are in accordance with our Research Tissue Bank approval, which is reported annually to our issuing Research Ethics Committee.
Claire Jones
NovoPath Proximity Lab Supervisor
Claire ensures the smooth day-to-day running of NovoPath, helping the adoption and management of research projects within cellular pathology. Claire’s long-standing contributions within cellular pathology are vital in helping to initiate bespoke prospective collections. An experienced biomedical scientist by background, Claire is a respected member of the Biobank Access Committee.
Claire Pringle
Clinical trial associate
Claire joined the RVI’s histology department in 2005 as a medical laboratory assistant after a change of career. Her main role was working in the sample reception and dissection in histopathology assisting biomedical scientists, advanced practitioners and medics. She continued to progress her career in histopathology by completing a Trust funded HEFC, then a Foundation degree in 2015. Claire joined the histology research team NovoPath in 2022 as a clinical trials associate. As a research CTA Claire consents patients for the Newcastle Hospitals Biobank and works in the histology department to process the biobank samples.
Tasleem Akhtar
Research nurse
As the second of our research nurses, Tasleem’s main role is to recruit patients to the biobank after obtaining their consent. A fully trained and registered nurse, having previously specialised in delivering cancer patient care, she’s responsible for establishing our endoscopy and respiratory disease patient cohorts.
Jake Lewis
Healthcare science associate practitioner
After graduating with a degree in biomedical sciences from Newcastle in 2018, Jake worked as a clinical scientist in urology. In 2024 Jake joined Novopath to return to a laboratory setting. Jake is currently working as a healthcare science associate practitioner and is training to undertake tasks within the research laboratories. Alongside this Jake maintains records of the Newcastle Hospitals Biobank and assists in sourcing new samples to store in the biobank for future research.
Jemma Hall
Administrator
Jemma is our administrator who communicates with our customers with regards to the status of their submitted biobank applications. Jemma also helps us to resolve customer enquiries, provide estimated project costings and to dispatch samples from the biobank.
Our team is on hand to discuss how we would support your work with our biobank services. Please contact us to discuss your requirements.
