The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre NHS Foundation Trust is delighted to announce that Joan Spencer has been appointed as its permanent Chief Executive.
Joan joined The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre in 2014, became an Executive Director in 2019 and has been Interim Chief Executive since 31 March 2025. She has now been appointed on a substantive basis following a national recruitment process and approval by the Council of Governors.
Merseyside born and bred, Joan started her career as a ward nurse and has carried the same values and commitment to doing the right thing for patients ever since. She specialised in cancer nursing before moving into management.
Joan was instrumental in developing The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre’s networked model of care with treatment sites across Cheshire and Merseyside, which means patients can access highly specialised cancer care closer to home. She led the operational planning for the new specialist 11-storey Clatterbridge Cancer Centre in Liverpool, ensuring it opened on time and on budget despite the COVID pandemic.
Joan was also the driving force in establishing the multi-award-winning ‘Clatterbridge in the Community’ service. This trailblazing approach was the UK’s first ‘chemotherapy at home’ service delivered by specially trained cancer nurses, and the model was subsequently adopted by other hospitals across the country.
More recently, she has played a pivotal role in system working and establishing partnerships to strengthen cancer pathways across Cheshire and Merseyside. This includes the sub-region’s award-winning work on developing specialist urgent and emergency cancer care, which has received national acclaim. It is the first programme in the UK focused on this overlooked area of patient care.
Joan is the Chair and Senior Responsible Officer for the Cheshire and Merseyside Cancer Alliance (CMCA). She has also overseen work to expand The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre’s pharmacy and logistics service, benefiting NHS organisations across Cheshire and Merseyside.
Before becoming Interim Chief Executive, Joan was Chief Operating Officer and Deputy Chief Executive at The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre.
On her appointment, Joan said:
It is an enormous honour and a privilege to have been appointed Chief Executive of The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre. I feel deeply connected to this organisation. As well as providing outstanding patient care, it has a unique warmth and a compassionate and innovative culture like nowhere else I have ever worked.
Our role over the next few years will be to continue building on this together with our partners across the system and beyond to keep improving patient experience and outcomes, with earlier diagnosis and wraparound support at every stage. In particular, I am also deeply committed to reducing the health inequalities that mean people in some communities tend to be diagnosed later and have poorer outcomes than those in more affluent areas.
Kathy Doran, Chair of The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre, said:
Joan is an exceptional, values-driven leader who is deeply committed to balancing high performance with compassionate patient care, innovation and a culture where everyone feels valued and included. She has great integrity and brings energy, razor-sharp attention to detail and clear strategic focus to everything she does.
She was hugely effective as Interim Chief Executive and I am very much looking forward to continuing to work with her.
The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre is consistently ranked as one of the best hospitals nationally for inpatient care and as a place to work. It continually innovates and has a strong track record of being the first to develop new services that recognise emerging themes in cancer care. Examples include its specialist award-winning immuno-toxicities service supporting patients on immunotherapy, and its metastatic spinal cord compression (MSCC) service which is the national exemplar.
The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre is renowned for its research on cancer vaccines and other early-phase trials. It has a NOF rating of 1 (the best-performing sector) and achieved its financial plan and cost improvement programme in 2025/26.
