Professor Sneyd was brought up in Cornwall and one of his first jobs was as a Nursing Auxiliary in Devonport Hospital, Plymouth – now long since demolished! He graduated from Cambridge University in 1981 and continued his medical training in London. Half way through he undertook a research degree and then spent a period working full time in the pharmaceutical industry before returning to work in the NHS.

After completing his UK anaesthetic training he worked at the University of Michigan Medical School at Ann Arbor, USA. In 1993, he returned to the South West as a Consultant Anaesthetist and after a few years moved to the University as Reader in Anaesthesia and then Professor. In 1998 he took over the running of the Plymouth Postgraduate Medical School, first as Acting Dean and then as Dean. He led the Plymouth team in the successful bid for a new Peninsula Medical School and served as Vice-Dean of the Peninsula College of Medicine and Dentistry. The first medical graduates have been working as NHS doctors since 1st August 2007 and the dental graduates have been doing so since 2011. He does his clinical work as a Consultant Anaesthetist at Derriford Hospital, mostly in neuro-anaesthesia and is very familiar with the interface between universities and the NHS.

Professor Sneyd’s research interests focus on drugs, pharmacology and pharmacokinetics with related projects based on signal processing. Having worked in the pharmaceutical industry he has a special interest in drug development, especially in Intravenous Anaesthesia. He worked as Executive Dean of the Plymouth University Peninsula Schools of Medicine and Dentistry in Plymouth, UK and led programmes in medicine and dentistry.

In anaesthesia he engaged nationally through AAGBI (Council 2006-9, Vice-President 2009-11) and the Royal College of Anaesthetists, UK where he was Vice-President (2011-2012) and internationally with the European Society of Anaesthesiology, ESA as a Director. In each case he has tried to represent the interests of patients and clinicians with an emphasis on sound strategy and common sense.