Keynote Speakers

Prof. Paul Bowie

PhD MSc C.ErgHF MIEHF FRCPEd FRCGP(Hon)

Paul is a Patient Safety Scientist and Chartered Ergonomist and Human Factors specialist. He has over 30 years of experience in a range of quality and safety leadership and advisory roles in healthcare and academia. He gained his doctorate in significant event analysis in primary care from the University of Glasgow in 2004 and has published over 200 articles on healthcare quality and safety in international peer-reviewed journals and co-edited a book on safety and improvement. Paul is Programme Director (Safety & Improvement) with NHS Education for Scotland and Professor of Human Factors for Health and Social Care at the University of Staffordshire University. He is also Honorary Professor in the Institute of Health and Wellbeing at the University of Glasgow and is an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh and the Royal College of General Practitioners.

Catherine Calderwood

Catherine Calderwood is a consultant obstetrician working in Edinburgh and a Professor at the University of Strathclyde. She served as Chief Medical Officer for Scotland from 2015 to 2020, providing national leadership on public health, patient safety, and healthcare quality improvement. A central part of her legacy is the development and championing of Realistic Medicine, Scotland’s approach to personalised, values-based care that emphasises shared decision-making, reducing harm, and tackling unwarranted variation.

Throughout her career, Catherine has been a strong advocate for improving outcomes for women, babies, and children, with a clear focus on reducing health inequalities and strengthening multidisciplinary working. She has played a key role in shaping national policy on maternity services, early years health, and population wellbeing.

As a speaker at this conference, Catherine brings valuable insight into how the principles of Realistic Medicine can support babies born with cleft lip and palate, ensuring care is compassionate, collaborative, and centred on individuals and families throughout their lives.

Toby Gillgrass

Toby is a consultant orthodontist, based in Glasgow at the Glasgow Dental Hospital and the Royal hospital for Children in Glasgow. Toby has been involved directly in cleft care now for over 20 years and is presently the Clinical Lead for the Cleft Surgical Service for Scotland and lead for the orthodontic Group for Cleft Care Scotland.

He represents the Cleft Surgical service for Scotland on the Cleft Development Group (CDG); the orthodontic representative on the Quality Monitoring Improvement Committee (QMIC) for the UK and was formerly a member of the Craniofacial Council.

Toby has been chair of Specialist Advisory Board for Orthodontics for the Royal College of surgeons of Edinburgh, a member of Specialist Advisory Committee (SAC) for orthodontics for the General Dental Council and is presently a member of Dental Council for Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. He was recently a recipient of a distinction award through the British Orthodontic Society and the Dental Faculty Medal through the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh.

Craig Russell

Craig is a Consultant Plastic, Reconstructive and Cleft Surgeon at NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, based at the Royal Hospital for Children, Glasgow and Canniesburn Plastic Surgery Unit. Appointed as a consultant in 2013, he has a long-standing subspecialist focus on cleft lip and palate surgery and cleft service development.

His commitment to cleft care was established during higher surgical training, culminating in appointment as a UK Training Interface Group Advanced Fellow in Cleft Surgery in Glasgow. During this period, he undertook international observerships in India, France and the United States, gaining broad experience in primary and secondary cleft repair, cleft rhinoplasty, naso-alveolar moulding, and delivery of cleft care in both high-resource and resource-limited settings.

Since consultant appointment, Mr Russell has held several senior leadership roles within Scottish and UK cleft services. These have included membership of the Cleft Care Scotland Network Executive, Clinical Audit and Information Governance Lead for Cleft Care Scotland, and Lead Clinician for the National Cleft Surgical Service for Scotland. He is currently clinical lead for Paediatric Plastic Surgery in NHS GG&C and chair of the Scottish Colleges Committee for Children’s Surgical Services. In these roles, he led the development of national audit reporting, contributed to service reconfiguration, and supported the establishment of robust governance structures and standardised clinical pathways.

At UK level, Craig is currently Clinical Project Lead for the Cleft Registry and Audit Network (CRANE) Database at the Clinical Effectiveness Unit of the Royal College of Surgeons of England. He has played a central role in modernising national cleft outcomes reporting, including the introduction of a formal UK cleft outlier policy and leadership of work on risk-adjusted outcome reporting for cleft speech and dental outcomes.

Mr Russell has an extensive academic portfolio focused on cleft outcomes, with numerous peer-reviewed publications and international presentations examining determinants of speech, hearing, dental, educational and psychosocial outcomes. His work reflects a sustained commitment to improving the quality, transparency and equity of cleft care through data-driven evaluation and outcomes-focused research.

Keynote Debate Speakers

Helen Extence

Helen Extence is the Lead Speech and Language Therapist (SLT) and Clinical Director (CD) of the Welsh Centre for Cleft Lip and Palate at Swansea Bay University Health Board. She was appointed as CD in 2018 and has served as Lead SLT since 2005. Helen has worked within the cleft service since 1996, following her qualification from Cardiff, University of Wales, in 1992.

As CD, Helen provides strategic leadership for the multidisciplinary cleft team, ensuring high‑quality, evidence‑based, patient‑centred care across the pathway. She is responsible for driving quality improvement initiatives that strengthen outcomes for all service users and is committed to supporting the professional growth of colleagues and trainees through teaching, supervision, and mentorship.

Helen leads a team of specialist SLTs and has developed a hub‑and‑link model of service delivery across South Wales, enhancing equitable access by embedding link therapists within each of the five regional Health Boards.

She is passionate about improving outcomes for individuals born with cleft lip and palate, with a strong focus on early engagement, early intervention, and preventing compensatory speech errors. Helen is committed to raising clinical standards across the team and strengthening national cleft audit activity to ensure that the best possible outcomes are achieved for service users.

An active member of the Lead Cleft SLT Forum, she has contributed significantly to national developments. Helen is also a CAPS‑A trainer, committed to supporting high‑quality audit assessment and maintaining the rigour and continued development of national audit processes.

Kate Le Marechal

Dr Kate le Maréchal is a Consultant Clinical Psychologist and Head of Service for the Evelina London Cleft Service. For more than sixteen years she has been embedded in multidisciplinary cleft care within one of the UK’s largest cleft centres, combining senior clinical leadership with day-to-day frontline MDT practice.

Alongside her Evelina role, Kate has held a range of national responsibilities in UK cleft care. She has represented psychology in key national forums including the Cleft Development Group, the Cleft Clinical Reference Group and, more recently, the Cleft Quality Monitoring and Improvement Committee, contributing to service development, quality improvement and research across the UK. She is a past President of the Craniofacial Society of Great Britain and Ireland and continues to teach and present widely within and beyond cleft care.

Kate also works internationally and is a member of the International Steering Committee for the charity CLEFT: Bridging the Gap. She is particularly involved in collaborative work with the cleft team in Nepal, supporting clinical development, training and sustainable service growth within a low-resource setting.

Kate feels privileged to provide clinical psychology input to individuals affected by cleft across the lifespan and throughout the treatment pathway. She places enormous value on multidisciplinary working and is a strong advocate for collaborative, comprehensive cleft care as the bedrock of the best possible outcomes for individuals affected by cleft—particularly in areas such as quality of life, confidence and satisfaction.

The CFSGBI conference is a highlight of Kate’s year, made even better when it is hosted in Scotland—the spiritual home of her favourite tipple, a good single malt whisky!