Tim Benson has spent most of his career in health care, focusing on healthcare computing. He originally trained as a mechanical engineer at the University of Nottingham, where he designed built and tested one of the first hovercraft built outside the aerospace industry.
He joined the NHS in 1974 to lead the evaluation of new computer systems being introduced at the Charing Cross Hospital in London. There he met some of the pioneers of healthcare outcome measures and saw their potential.
In 1980, he established one of the first GP computer suppliers, which developed problem-oriented patient records for use in the consulting room and the Read Codes, which led later to SNOMED CT. From about 1990, he focused on health interoperability, HL7 and later FHIR.
In the mid-2000s, he began a project to develop a short generic health outcome measure. This was followed by a patient experience and other measures, leading to founding R-Outcomes Ltd and this book.