David Phillips brings his lived experience of bereavement by suicide, together with his lifetime experience, creative and analytical skills, to his role as strategic advisor in the Experience Experts Group.
David is Founder and Chair of Trustees at The Anna Phillips Foundation, a registered charity which helps people with trauma related mental health challenges through ecotherapy activities and collaborates with researchers in the field. The charity was founded in memory of David’s daughter who took her life in 2015.
David is a member of the PTSD Public Advisory Group (PAG) at the National Centre for Mental Health (NCMH), where he is also chair of the Prolonged Grief Disorder PAG. He is co-author of a protocol for a feasibility random controlled trial study on a digital therapy for prolonged grief. He is also honorary Lecturer at the School of Health Sciences, Bangor University.
David co-designed the framework, terms and values of the National Adults and Older Persons Lived Experience Advisory Group with IMROC and NHS Wales Performance and Improvement.
Through various NHS Leadership Exchanges and the Research and Evidence Network, he contributed to preparations for the launch of the Open Access Mental Health Support programme across Wales, and he continues to contribute during its implementation.
David works with NHS Wales Performance and Improvement to develop an empowering, sensitive and responsive framework for the Suicide and Self-Harm Lived Experience Group.
David is a chemistry graduate from Leeds University, and has worked as a research chemist, as well as a management consultant in the financial services sector.
He has fundraised for RNIB in a 24-hour marathon swim, and for the cancer ward of a local hospital by walking up Snowdon at night. He enjoys good books and music, exploring nature and making sense of it all through watercolours.