Note Conservative meeting Chief Medical Officer, scratching head (6)
I believe the answer is:
chitty
'note' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)
'conservative meeting chief medical officer scratching head' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'conservative' could be 'c' (UK political abbreviation) and 'c' is located in the answer.
'meeting' could be 'hit' (hit is a kind of meeting) and 'hit' is found within the answer.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for chitty that I've seen before include "Note (bang if doubled!)" , "Short note - voucher" .)