FORMER NHS trust chairman and consultant psychiatrist Olywn Kathleen Ockelford died peacefully at home on January 12, aged 88.

Born in Manchester in 1925, Dr Ockelford went to Manchester High School for Girls before becoming one of the first women to study Natural Sciences (medicine) at the University of Cambridge.

Her father was a member of the Fabian Society and strongly believed in the value of a good education in bringing greater equality to the country, a belief his only daughter retained throughout her life.

Dr Ockelford continued her medical studies during the Second World War with the intention of becoming a GP, and was among the first women to receive a Cambridge degree when Girton College was admitted as an official college in 1948, of which she was rightly proud.

After finishing her training she began to practise as a locum GP, moving to Poole after meeting her future husband Charles ‘Malcolm’ Ockelford, an officer in the Royal Navy.

The pair were married on March 29, 1952, and their first house was The Riggs, overlooking Poole Bay.

Dr Ockelford took a break from her work in order to raise their two children, David and Carly, who were born in 1956 and 1958 respectively.

During the late 1950s and early 1960s she and her husband both worked as Liberal councillors in Poole, and were associated with the Parkstone Yacht Club and the Royal Naval Sailing Association.

During the 1970s they moved to the Bristol area where Dr Ockelford qualified as a consultant psychiatrist, eventually specialising in child psychology.

A lifelong asthma sufferer, Dr Ockelford also experienced a serious heart problem in 1979, and after undergoing then-experimental surgery was given around five years to live, an estimate she would beat by decades.

When they returned to Poole in the early 1980s she worked for mental health hospitals in the area, including St Ann’s, and eventually she was appointed as the first chairman of the Dorset Healthcare NHS Trust, until her retirement in 1997.

She was involved in many community organisations, from the local U3A branch and Mothers’ Union to the Holy Angels Church in Lilliput and the Poole Conservative Association.

She was also a member of the National Council For Women.

Dr Ockelford was driven by a desire to achieve her best in all she did, and to help others in doing so. In her time at the trust she strived to put the needs of individual patients above those of the institution.

To her children she is remembered as a loving mother who did her utmost to ensure they had a well-rounded education as well as a fun childhood.