Dr Allan Johnston has been appointed to three new positions within the world of sport. The English Institute of Sport (EIS) employed Dr Johnston as Sports Psychiatrist to the Mental Health Expert Panel supporting our Great Britain Olympic and Paralympic athletes in preparation for the Tokyo Olympic Games. The League Managers Association (LMA) appointed Dr Johnston as Consultant Performance Psychiatrist in a new role to guide and shape the Mental Health and Wellbeing programme for Premier League and Football League managers, to develop the game wide wellbeing strategy and provide one to one support for football managers and coaches. Burnley Football Club appointed Dr Johnston to a new role in Premiership Football in leading the development of the clubs mental health strategy and provision of mental health care for both 1st team and academy players and coaching staff.
The Bradford Bulls RLFC employed Allan as the world’s first Rugby League Sports Psychiatrist in 2012. He now works with athletes across a range of sports, dance and performance disciplines. Since leaving the Bradford Bulls, as Medical Director and Sports Psychiatrist to Synergy Medicine Ltd Allan has developed an independent sports medicine service in Leeds that works with all levels of conditions and injuries in Athletes and Dancers. Allan works with clients on all aspects of Wellbeing and Performance and how these interrelate. As part of this work he has been recognised by the UK Anti-Doping authority (UKAD) as having special expertise in the assessment and management of ADHD. Dr Johnston sits on the UKAD specialist register for ADHD Therapeutic Use Exemption assessments.
He is a co-founder of, and then elected to, the position of Deputy Chair of the Royal College of Psychiatrists Sports and Exercise Psychiatry Special Interest Group - the Royal Colleges fastest growing Special Interest Group. Via this national group Dr Johnston co-ordinates training for UK Sports Psychiatrists.
With a strong passion for all sport, Allan works on a voluntary basis as Sports Psychiatrist and Trustee to State of Mind Sport, a charity aiming to improve the mental health and wellbeing of athletes and their communities.
In his NHS role Dr Johnston chaired the Derbyshire Suicide Prevention Strategy Group 2013-2018 and led a range of innovations in the region including the development of the regional strategy, a greater involvement of service users in co-producing their own care and chairing Suicide Prevention conferences and World Suicide Prevention Day initiatives. Since 2015, over 3 successive years, suicide rates in Derbyshire almost halved with reduced rates seen particularly in men.
He has recently been awarded the Everything in Sport 2019 national award for supporting the mental health of female athletes and was made Yorkshire’s Doctor of the Year 2019 at the YEP healthcare awards. He lives with his family in Yorkshire.
