A former Ashby School student has been named in the new year's honours list.

Tony Avery, a GP and Professor of Primary Healthcare, and a Senior Investigator for the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR), will receive an OBE for services to General Practice.

Professor Avery was an A-Level pupil at Ashby School in the 1978-80 year.

His research focuses on patient safety in primary care, which is a priority area for the NHS, and he has led ground-breaking studies to identify the frequency, nature and cause of prescribing errors and avoidable harm in primary care.

Professor Avery has also developed and evaluated a range of interventions that have led to improvements in patient safety.

One example being a pharmacist-led information-technology-based intervention (called PINCER), which was effective (and cost effective) at reducing prescribing errors in general practice in a large cluster-randomised trial.

It has now been rolled out to more than 2,500 general practices across England and as a result, over 20,000 patients have benefitted from safer prescriptions.

Professor Avery said: "I'm absolutely delighted to receive this honour, and I would like to thank all my colleagues for the contribution they have made to my career.

"I would particularly like to thank my wife, Chris, and my family and friends for their love and support."

Professor Avery has worked in the medical field for more than 35 years.

After completing his undergraduate medical degree at the University of Sheffield in 1986, he then went on to complete his GP training in Nottingham, and has been a clinical academic at the University of Nottingham since 1992.

He was appointed as the Director of Research for the School of Medicine at Nottingham in 2013 and was Dean and Head of Nottingham School of Medicine from 2015-2019.

Professor Avery also works as a GP at the Valley Surgery, Chilwell, Nottingham.