When introducing new technologies and services into the NHS, evaluating the true costs and real-world impact is rarely straightforward. Jo Hanlon, Project Director in the NHS sector at YHEC, draws on over 20 years of NHS experience to help decision makers navigate complex evaluation challenges and build robust, practical evidence bases. In this blog, we interview Jo to find out how she transitioned from public health commissioning to health economics, how her team evaluates emerging innovations like AI, and what she enjoys most about her role at YHEC.
What is your name and role?
I’m Jo Hanlon, and I’m a Project Director in the NHS sector.
Tell us about your qualifications and career path that brought you to YHEC
I joined YHEC in 2014, having spent 23 years in the NHS. After an applied biology degree and a post-graduate course in health promotion, my early career was in public health and scientific research. I went on to complete a Master’s in Public Health at York and become a Registered Public Health Specialist. I eventually found my niche in a senior management role in NHS public health and commissioning. When I made the transition to YHEC, there were only three of us in the NHS team and now it’s grown unrecognisably!
What is the main focus of your work at YHEC?
The heart of my work is performing economic evaluations to support the introduction of new technologies and services into the NHS and social care systems, plus some evaluation of existing tools. It’s real-world evaluation, and I often handle the ‘messy’ projects where the path forward isn’t immediately clear. The clients I work with are often NHS and social care managers or decision makers in government departments, and they need a clear, robust analysis of the value of an innovation for NHS bodies, social care or other governmental departments.
What’s a key challenge that you help YHEC’s clients overcome?
A major challenge that we help clients with is identifying the true costs of doing something differently. For example, it’s easy to see the upfront cost of an innovation, but we could help them understand the associated costs: How does this fit into current care? Is it displacing something else? Is it adding to the standard of care? What’s needed to embed it in practice? Will overall costs increase by doing this?
Another challenge is that sometimes the benefits of an intervention will not be realised in a typical 1- or 3-year budget cycle. Sometimes, an intervention will lead to better health outcomes, but it costs more in the short term. It’s really important to understand our clients’ perspective and what’s important to them, and I think my NHS experience is valuable here.
How do you approach a new project to ensure that the advice you give is the most rigorous and reliable?
Again, it goes back to understanding the client’s perspective and what is it that they’re trying to achieve, so we always start with that. For complex projects, I often find it helpful to use a logic model or theory of change. In situations where the benefits aren’t easily monetised, this can help with identifying what data we need, what metrics we need to measure the data, and how we value them. Developing a logic model helps to piece all that together and make sure we’re developing a data specification that is realistic.
Do you have favourite methods, or are there any methodological developments that interest you?
I like to focus on what is most useful for the client, helping them understand what is important, how we can measure it, and how to present it in a way that is meaningful and usable – sometimes a short case study is more useful than a dense technical report, for example.
I also like methods that tell a story, which perhaps comes from my background in public health and the NHS. I enjoy exploring how something will work in practice; for example, what it will mean for a staff nurse on the ward or a GP sitting with a patient.
When a client works with you, how and where will they notice your impact on the success of the project?
My work with clinicians and the NHS has given me a really good understanding of how the system works, and I can use this expertise for our clients: I can identify when something is unlikely to resonate with NHS decision makers and help clients avoid a path that won’t yield real-world results.
We’re also able to deliver highly usable tools, developing things like budget impact models, cost-benefit analyses, and practical cost calculators for clients that support meaningful engagement with the NHS. A great example of this is our work in the field of obstetrics, including projects evaluating a biomarker test for pre-eclampsia and premature rupture of membranes in pregnant women. We developed models that the client can populate with Trust-specific data to generate relevant figures. That kind of practical impact feels truly useful.
What’s one project you’ve worked on recently that you’re particularly proud of, and why?
We do a lot of work with the Yorkshire and Humber Health Innovation Network (HIN), which I find rewarding because they like to share the findings and get information into the public domain. One project that I’m particularly proud of is our work with them on the ‘Heidi’ ambient voice technology evaluation. We evaluated an AI system that records clinical consultations and produces summaries, allowing clinicians to focus on the patient instead of typing notes. Our evaluation showed staff time savings, a reduction in cognitive burden for staff and the clinical audits were good. It was so well-received that it led to HIN webinars and an invitation to present at the annual British Geriatrics Society conference.
The outcomes were particularly meaningful because they showed the potential for digital innovation to address a very practical challenge faced across the NHS: balancing the need for accurate clinical documentation with the pressure on clinicians’ time. Evidence that the technology could reduce cognitive burden while maintaining quality gave a valuable insight into how these tools might support more sustainable models of care.
What’s one emerging trend that you are paying close attention to?
We’ve been engaged with the increased demand for evaluation of AI-led healthcare interventions, and the ambient voice technology that I mentioned previously is a perfect example: the AI-driven ambient voice tools appear to be incredibly helpful for clinicians in their day-to-day practice.
The growing use of AI in healthcare presents exciting opportunities, but it also creates new questions for decision makers around evidence, implementation, data protection, equity and value for money. Independent evaluation is crucial to help the NHS understand which technologies have the potential to deliver meaningful benefits and under what circumstances they should be adopted. The Heidi evaluation is a good example of how generating evidence in real-world NHS settings can help decision makers understand not just whether a technology works, but how it can be used effectively within services. It feels as though this sector is only going to get bigger!
What is the most rewarding part of your job or what do you enjoy most about working at YHEC?
On a professional level, the most rewarding part of my work is when a client is truly happy because a project has gone well. When we can deliver robust results that align with their goals, it is incredibly satisfying.
Another thing that really motivates me is producing high-quality reports that are published on government websites, because you know they’ll be cited in future grey literature searches and there will be a lasting impact.
As for what I enjoy most about working at YHEC, I think we have a fantastic working environment with a really supportive group of people. I also appreciate the company’s values too: coming from the NHS, I like that YHEC is part of the University of York, that we pride ourselves on our academic rigour and our robust approach. Ultimately, people come to us because of who we are: an organisation they can trust for independent and rigorous assessment, combined with a real-world understanding of the issues hitting the desks of NHS finance directors and decision-makers.
What’s your favourite thing to do outside work?
My absolute favourite things are to spend time outdoors and be around animals. I have two cats of my own and I love spending time with them – and with the neighbour’s sheep when they are in our paddock! In fact, when I finally hang up my health economics hat, I’d like to try something like volunteering at an animal rescue.
Tell us a surprising or fun fact about yourself!
My main hobby is music: I’ve played the violin in amateur symphony orchestras my entire adult life and currently play with the Scarborough Symphony Orchestra. I wouldn’t want to not be doing it; it’s something I’ve shared with close friends since my school days, and it’s how I met my best friend at university, so it’s been a big part of my life.
How can YHEC support healthcare systems and the public sector?
If you’re looking for an experienced partner to help generate the evidence needed for NHS decision-making, we’d love to hear from you. Explore how YHEC supports the NHS and healthcare organisations, or get in touch to discuss your project.