Consultant Diabetes and Endocrinology, University Hospitals Southampton NHS Foundation Trust 

Dr Mayank Patel has spent 26 years transforming diabetes care at University Hospitals Southampton and beyond — quietly, modestly, and with an unwavering focus on patient safety. As Service Lead for Diabetes, he has driven inpatient harm and error rates consistently below national averages, won six national Quality in Care Diabetes awards in 14 years, and built an educational legacy that reaches far beyond Southampton’s walls.

Recognising the need to educate at scale, Mayank created a free inpatient diabetes app now adopted and adapted by multiple NHS trusts. He has delivered insulin safety teaching to every new doctor at his hospital annually since 2008, produced six free patient education comics for national charities, and helped secure one of only two Diabetes UK national grants in 2022 to further develop inpatient services. His local impact earned national roles including the NaDIA development group and the COVID diabetes response group, contributing to guideline development used across the NHS.

What distinguishes Mayank is his commitment beyond contracted hours — delivering talks, creating resources, and collaborating with UK diabetes charities without remuneration for over a decade. A Royal College of Physicians Excellence in Patient Care Awards finalist and BMJ Awards finalist for digital diabetes work, he remains, by all accounts, quietly determined rather than loudly ambitious.

His philosophy: safe diabetes care is everyone’s responsibility — and his life’s work has been ensuring the whole NHS understands that.

Mayank is featured as one of 78 NHS South East colleagues celebrated in a campaign marking the NHS’s 78th birthday and the first anniversary of England’s 10 Year Health Plan.