The Out Of Programme (OOP) podcast shines a spotlight on clinicians who have ventured beyond the traditional path of clinical training to forge unique and unconventional careers.
Hosted by Dr Jing Ouyang, this series delves into the diverse backgrounds, driving motivations and transformative moments that shaped their journeys outside the realm of medicine. Whether you’re a clinician curious about life beyond the white coat or simply fascinated by stories of bold career reinvention, this podcast offers inspiring conversations and thought-provoking insights that go beyond the ordinary.
Episode 41: Dr Shantanu Kundu on Founding a Mental Health Charity at 15, Becoming the First Episode 41: LTFT Foundation Doctor, and Building Innovation Inside Alder Hey.
What happens when a 15-year-old starts a mental health blog to survive stigma, and a decade later is still running the national charity it became, while becoming the first LTFT foundation doctor in his hospital and building innovation inside Alder Hey?
In this episode, we speak with Dr Shantanu Kundu, foundation doctor, Chief Executive of the Be Free Campaign, NHS Clinical Entrepreneur, and innovation consultant at Alder Hey Children's Hospital.
📝 Lived experience of youth mental health and stigma in an ethnic minority community, and how a teenage blog grew into Be Free
🌱 Scaling a youth-led charity from a £300 O2 seed grant into a national organisation spanning community delivery, campaigning, and commercial ventures
🏥 Being the first person in his hospital to do a 60% foundation programme, and what the system still cannot flex around
💡 Finding Alder Hey innovation (and Ian Hennessey) before he was even a doctor, and designing pathways that spread children's innovation beyond tertiary centres
Shantanu's story is a masterclass in building from lived experience, refusing a single track, and making the NHS and charity worlds flex around the impact you want to have.
Follow us on: 🗞 Substack (https://outofprogramme.substack.com/) 💼 LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/outofprogramme) ▶ YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@OutOfProgramme)
🎧 Listen on: Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/1ZbQCk6B9ongfOvKFCxIdx) | Apple Podcasts (https://podcasts.apple.com/ie/podcast/out-of-programme/id1791647812)
22 Sept 2026
Episode 40: Beating the Odds from Kenya to UK Medicine, Becoming a GP and Building Healthcare AI Agents at Antler
What happens when one of 15,000 applicants wins a scholarship from Kenya to UCL Medicine — then rebuilds her idea of “scale” from the GP surgery to agentic AI?
In this episode, we speak with Dr Sheliza Darvesh, GP, former Babylon clinical ops lead, and co-founder & COO of Conversico, building an agentic AI operating layer for healthcare (starting with a voice receptionist) as an Antler entrepreneur in residence.
🏝️ Growing up on a Kenyan island in a single-parent home — school fees from a community “pot,” then learning who had quietly paid all along
🎓 Beating 15,000 applicants for the African Educational Trust Scholarship to study medicine at UCL — and arriving with one suitcase, chickenpox scars, and a ruinous Heathrow black cab
📚 Staying in the top 10% every year to keep the scholarship, walking Camden to UCL to save bus fares, and finding family in friends’ kitchens
🏥 Choosing GP for patient volume, then realising true scale meant helping more than one person every ten minutes — into Babylon, Manual/Voi, and clinical ops
🤖 Co-founding Conversico with her husband to free clinicians from fragmented admin — and why Antler cared more about founder–market fit than the pitch deck
Sheliza’s story is a masterclass in adversity, kindness, and redesigning a medical career so impact — and the freedom to give back — can finally scale.
Follow us on: 🗞 Substack (https://outofprogramme.substack.com/) 💼 LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/outofprogramme) ▶ YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@OutOfProgramme)
🎧 Listen on: Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/1ZbQCk6B9ongfOvKFCxIdx) | Apple Podcasts (https://podcasts.apple.com/ie/podcast/out-of-programme/id1791647812)
8 Sept 2026
Episode 39: Dr Hatim Abdulhussein on Becoming an AI Professor With No PhD, Setting Up the Topol Fellowship, and Leading a Health Innovation Network
What happens when an "average medical student" co-founds the Topol Programme, becomes an AI professor without a PhD, and rises to run a health innovation network while still seeing patients every Friday?
In this episode, we speak with Dr Hatim Abdulhussein, a GP who became CEO of Health Innovation Kent Surrey Sussex and Honorary Professor of Innovation and AI at the University of Surrey — one of the UK's leading clinician-innovators working inside the system.
• 🧑 How a foundation doctor in Bedford who "didn't think being an entrepreneur was an option" learned to make change from within the NHS
• 🎓 Co-founding the Topol Programme for Digital Health Fellows — the "gift of time" that's now run through six or seven cohorts of digital health leaders
• 🤖 Getting into AI before it was cool — building the subject-matter expertise that let him advise ministers before the ChatGPT explosion
• 🏛️ Why he chose to change the NHS from within rather than leave it, and the value of an entrepreneurial mindset inside organisations
• 🎓 Becoming an Honorary Professor of Innovation and AI without a PhD — the clinical teaching track and the power of "say yes and learn by doing"
• 🏥 Rising from Medical Director to CEO of a Health Innovation Network — and why he still protects his Friday GP clinic
Hatim's story is a masterclass in experiential leadership — building a portfolio career on the clinical teaching track, saying yes to opportunity, and proving you don't need to leave the NHS to have a national impact.
Follow us on: 🗞 Substack (https://outofprogramme.substack.com/) 💼 LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/outofprogramme) ▶ YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/@OutOfProgramme)
🎧 Listen on: Spotify (https://open.spotify.com/show/1ZbQCk6B9ongfOvKFCxIdx) | Apple Podcasts (https://podcasts.apple.com/ie/podcast/out-of-programme/id1791647812)
Reach and audience
Public platform figures. Ratings count people who left a rating, not total listeners.
YouTube views
438
Score snapshot 15 Sept 2025
Spotify
5.0 / 5
6 ratings
Podcast Authority Score: 18 / 100
A composite of feed quality, social presence, YouTube performance and engagement. Read the methodology.
Quality
11
Social presence
0
YouTube
66
Engagement
0
Contact Out Of Programme
Guest appearances
Does not typically book guests
Based on episode analysis; this does not confirm that the show is currently accepting guests.
Host of Out Of Programme?
Claim your podcast to manage its listing and keep your show details accurate.
Pod Engine is an independent podcast discovery and analytics service and is not affiliated with or endorsed by this podcast. Artwork and show content belong to their owners. Full legal notice.
Explore this show Podcast research with Pod Engine
