Ros qualified as a doctor at Cambridge University in 1980. She initially worked as a GP in Cumbria. In 1992 she joined some pioneers to establish a palliative care unit in West Cumbria Hospital and became enthused by the speciality. In 1996, she took on the leadership role at the Hospice of St Francis in Berkhamsted, Herts, a post she held until March 2015.
During her time at St Francis she grew the medical team, the senior management team, secured funding for a Consultant in Palliative Medicine, appointed the first hospice fundraiser and transformed Day Hospice into the Spring Centre! Her main achievement was securing a site for a new 14-bedded hospice building, overseeing the construction project and creation of the garden.
She then became Clinical Director at Hospice UK, a national umbrella charity for the hospice movement, and most recently has been back at the bedside as a palliative physician in the busy palliative care team at the Royal Marsden and Royal Brompton Hospitals in London.
Dr Taylor now has over 26 years experience in palliative care and was awarded an MBE for Services to Hospice Care following a nomination by a St Francis patient. She has recently contributed a chapter on spirituality through the lens of a doctor, in a new book Spirituality and Hospice Care. She is contributing to the new Lancet Commission on the Value of Death and is a senior advisor to the Montreal 2020 International Congress on Palliative Care.
She tweets as @hospicedoctor and is a Deputy Lieutenant in the county of Hertfordshire!