[2] From 1964-1969 he held charge nurse's posts in Essex, Bristol and Bath, before entering the Borough Polytechnic in London to take the Sister Tutors' Diploma course.
[6][10] He returned to the UK and gained a PhD at Kings College London University of London) for his thesis Knowledge of the life sciences as a basis for practice: some problems in nurse education awarded in 1984[11] This explored his influential concept of bio-nursing, which he defined as clinical nursing that uses in practice the principles of natural sciences such as biology.
[12] From 1985-1989 he was at the Dorset Institute of Higher Education, first as Reader[1] and later Professor and Head of the Health Care Research Unit, making him one of the early nurse-professors.
[6] In 1991, Akinsanya published the results of a major national study of attitudes of nurses and their teachers to Aids he had carried out in Who Will Care?
[16] He died in London at the age of 68 after contracting an infection at the International Council of Nurses conference in Taiwan some months earlier.