Hilary has a background in health research and management as well as a clinical background as a registered general nurse, midwife and health visitor. Her main areas of interest are supporting organisations to implement evidence-based practice, improving performance in practice and the impact of organisational culture on professional practice and organisational outcomes. Hilary is particularly interested in using asset-based approaches in the development of public health initiatives and in gaining and maintaining compliance with public health policies and legislation.
The areas of work she is currently involved in includes implementing midwifery continuity of care, developing and implementing sector led improvement tools, reducing the prevalence of smoking in pregnancy, secondary care and mental health. She led the development of babyClear, an evidence based whole-systems approach converting the evidence and guidance into practice.
She is also involved in developing and applying sector led improvement tools which support the commissioning and delivery of public health interventions. Along with the Institute of Health Visiting, she recently developed and implemented an SLI tool to support the commissioning and delivery of evidence based health visiting and school nursing services.
Hilary leads the team that provides tobacco and alcohol CLeaR peer assessments across England. She also led the development and piloting of a toolkit to help local authorities protect their health policy from the vested interests of the tobacco industry.
Hilary sits on the Pregnancy Challenge group, was a professional member of the Public Health Programme Development group for the NICE guidance PH48 Smoking in Secondary Care, has been a topic advisor to the NICE Quality Standards Advisory Committee and is an Expert Advisor for the NICE Centre for Guidelines. She is a member of the ASH Advisory Council and the All Party Parliamentary CO Group’s (APPCOG) Healthcare Sub-Group and acts as an expert advisor to WHO Europe.