 He was an Imperial Cancer Research Fund (ICRF) research fellow in medical oncology at St Bartholomew's Hospital in London (1982–86), and then an oncology consultant at Guy's Hospital in London (1986–95), becoming a Reader in 1991.He was clinical director of Cancer Services at Guy's and St Thomas' Hospital in London (1991–99) and Sainsbury Professor of Palliative Medicine at St Thomas' Hospital from 1995.He was head of the Academic Division of Oncology at King's College London from 1998–99 and chair of the National Cancer Research Institute from 2006–08.