Our Board of Directors carry the full governance responsibility for the organisation.
By law, they have individual and joint responsibility for what happens within our Foundation. This means that if our Foundation does not meet its legal duties, the Board are responsible both as individuals and together as a board, committee, council or other core group (referred to in this Code as the ‘board’).
No Director receives any payment for their contribution or support for our Foundation.
Dan is one of the founder members of The Irish Sleep Apnoea Trust (ISAT) and has served as Chair of The European Lung Foundation (ELF). He is also a past member of the leadership of the European Respiratory Society, the ERS Advocacy Council, Tobacco Control Committee and the Environment and Health Committee as well as several Respiratory Task Forces/Clinical Research Collaborations.
He has been published widely in The European Respiratory Journal, The British Medical Journal and a number of European Political Publications, mainly relating to patients with chronic respiratory conditions.
Margaret Considine is highly experienced and award winning Management Consultant who works with some of the major companies in Ireland and Europe assisting them in strategy formulation and implementation, management and leadership development, negotiations, coaching, mediations & people development. Margaret has extensive experience in both private & public sector clients and works nationally and internationally
Margaret has built a career on commercial acumen and has held a number of national and international senior posts to directorship level in consulting, service and manufacturing organisations. Margaret has worked extensively across the UK, Europe and the USA and continues to actively work in Europe, Asia pacific, Middle East and North America. Margaret’s experience stretches across a number of industry sectors including I.T., recruitment, distribution, manufacturing, consultancy, banking, fast food, the drinks industry, education, health and tourism sectors.
Margaret is active in the world of academia and holds the post of Associate Faculty Member, designing, programme directing, leading or contributing on programmes since 1996, including University of Dublin Trinity College Masters programmes. Margaret also has held associate faculty posts in RCPI, Napier University in Scotland and Massey University in New Zealand.
Margaret is the author of six published books.
Mr Grainger is a medical graduate of Trinity College Dublin. In 1988 Mr Grainger was appointed Consultant Urologist to The Meath Hospital, St James Hospital and The National Medical Rehabilitation Hospital Dun Laoghaire. Following the move of The Meath Hospital to Tallaght in 1998, he continued as a Consultant Urologist in Tallaght until his retirement from public practice in 2012.
He is an active member of The Irish Kidney Association and Transplant Team Ireland.
In October 2016 he was chosen as an Ambassador for the Fit For Life Programme, organised by The World Transplant Games Federation and is a strong supporter of organ donation.
Joe Hayes retired from the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) in June 2014. He served as Ireland’s ambassador to China, to Denmark and Iceland, to the Czech Republic and Ukraine and latterly as ambassador to Singapore with dual accreditation to Indonesia, The Philippines, Brunei and Timor Leste.
He worked in Armagh as Joint Secretary of the North South Ministerial Council. He was Ireland’s representative on the Board of the Asia Europe Foundation and architect of Ireland’s first Asis Strategy. He also served in Irish Embassies in Bonn, Moscow and London, as Deputy Legal Advisor, as Press Officer and as Press Secretary to the Minister.
Prior to joining DFAT Joe worked as a lawyer with the IDA and as a journalist with Independent Newspapers.
Sharee Basdeo graduated from Trinity College Dublin, the University of Dublin, with a B.A. in Natural Sciences with a Moderatorship in Molecular Medicine. She completed her PhD in 2014 in the School of Biochemistry and Immunology. Sharee’s research interest include understanding T Cell and Microphage function and plasticity in health and disease settings and the importance of the innate-adaptive synapse in governing immune outcomes. Her work to date has been highly translational and she has published papers in the field of autoimmunity (rheumatoid arthritis and multiple sclerosis), transplant and more recently has turned her attention to infectious diseases. Sharee’s current research endeavours are focused on the generation of host-directed therapies for antibiotic resistant infections, for which she has recently been awarded her own research funding. Sharee presents her work at international conferences and has been an invited speaker on several occasions. In addition, she is dedicated to science communication with the lay public and is involved in a number of outreach activities.
Sharee contributes to the running of her host institute; She serves on two committees for the Trinity Translational Medicine Institute at St James’s Hospital and is also currently the Post-Doctoral Research Fellow representative on the Faculty of Health Science Executive Committee.
Outside the lab, Sharee has been involved in volunteer work with the Church of Ireland for the past 15 years. She is serving on Diocesan Councils for a second triennium.
Lillian has worked at a senior level in the voluntary sector for the last twenty five years. From 1998 to 2004 she held the role of Chief Executive Officer with Victim Support in supporting victims of crime nationally by building a national network of support services.
Lillian took over the role of Chief Executive with the Marie Keating Foundation cancer charity in 2006 and held this role for a further seven years. During this time she developed a solid funding base for the charity through the diversification of income streams in challenging times.
Lillian worked with the National Children’s Hospital Foundation, based at Tallaght University Hospital from 2015 to 2020. She was responsible for managing the affairs of the Foundation in providing financial support to the children’s hospital through support services and paediatric research supported by donor, community and corporate support.
Lillian’s voluntary contribution has included membership of the National Crime Council, the Irish Parole Board and since 2018 she has been an active Board member of the Irish Motor Neurone Disease Association.
She completed an MSc in Organisational Behaviour with Trinity College, Dublin in 2005, a Post Graduate Diploma in Digital Marketing in 2014 and a Diploma in Quality Management Systems for Voluntary Organisations with the University of Limerick in 2015.
Derek is head of retirement asset services in the Dublin Office of Smith & Williamson. He is an associate of the Irish Institute of Pension Managers and a fellow of the Pensions Management Institute in the UK. Derek is approved by the Revenue Commissioners as a Pensioner Trustee and acts as the Pensioneer Trustee for over 150 individual pension arrangements. He is also experienced in structuring and operating bespoke approved retirement schemes for the Smith & Williamson Group in Ireland. He has a Bachelor of Commerce Degree from University College Dublin.
Professor Seamas Donnelly is a graduate of University College Galway (UCG) and completed his respiratory and general medicine training at the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh. As Lecturer in Respiratory Medicine at the University of Edinburgh he successfully competed for a Welcome Trust Advanced Fellowship which enabled him to work at the Picower Institute in New York, an internationally renowned research centre affiliated with Rockefeller University.
Professor Donnelly returned to UCD and St Vincent’s University Hospital in 2001. As Head of Medicine at St Vincent’s University Hospital he was responsible for the rolling out of the new modular medical curriculum on campus. He is recognised as an international leader in translational medicine and his research epitomizes classical bench to bedside on an international stage. The work of his research group is leading to novel therapies in respiratory disease, particularly asthma, COPD and sarcoidosis.
He was one of the first clinicians to be awarded a Science Foundation Ireland (SFI) Principal Investigator Programme grant award which was recently renewed for a further five years. This work has focused on the development of novel small molecular-weight anti-inflammatory agents targeting chronic inflammatory diseases particularly pertaining to the lung. He is a co-applicant on the recently awarded Wellcome Trust/HRB Dublin Clinical Research Facility.
In 2010 he was awarded an Honorary Professorship by the University of Edinburgh. The University of Edinburgh is currently ranked among the top 20 universities in the world and following the recent UK Research Assessment Exercise, has been ranked number one with regards to medical research. The citation from Edinburgh University recognised Professor Donnelly as an international leader in medical research.
In 2013 he was appointed Editor-in-Chief of the Quarterly Journal of Medicine (QJM), an international medical journal published by Oxford University Press (OUP).
