Category: Clinical

Institute of Global Health Innovation April update

IGHI

  • New Adjunct and Visiting Professors announced. Forming effective collaborations is important to the Institute of Global Health Innovation (IGHI). By working in partnership with established academics, policy makers and business leaders, we can make better-informed decisions and obtain a broader understanding of the issues facing global health today. IGHI are pleased to announce our new Adjunct and Visiting Professors who have recently been appointed within the institute.

 

Jo Seed
Communications and Events Officer
Institute of Global Health Innovation

Imperial BRC health informatics programme to facilitate research across AHSCs

Professor Dame Sally Davies

The NIHR Imperial BRC is a partner in a new £8M health informatics programme to enable the collaborative sharing of routinely collected NHS data to facilitate more effective clinical research.

The programme, called the NIHR Health Informatics Collaborative (NIHR-HIC), is a challenge from the Chief Medical Officer Professor Dame Sally Davies to the five NHS Trusts in England with the largest Biomedical Research Centres, i.e. Imperial, Oxford, Cambridge, UCLH and GSST, to collaborate and demonstrate how sharing of NHS clinical information held electronically, can facilitate more effective clinical research, and lead to benefits for patients and the public, researchers and NHS staff.

This new initiative was publicly announced recently by Dame Sally. It follows the government’s ‘Plan for Growth’ which details a number of actions designed to promote the UK as a competitive global hub for life sciences.

For Imperial College London and Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust this initiative will deliver IT capability to support the sharing and use of NHS data for research in five scientific themes: viral hepatology (led by Graham Cooke and Mark Thursz), ovarian cancer (led by Christina Fotopoulou and Hani Gabra), renal transplantation (led by Adam McLean and David Taube) intensive care medicine (Led by Simon Ashworth and Stephen Brett) and acute coronary syndromes (led by John Chambers and Jamil Mayet). Each pan-BRC theme is led by one of the BRCs and Imperial is leading on Acute Coronary Syndrome.

Alongside these activities, the NIHR-HIC Programme will engage patients, the public and other stakeholders to agree an integrated governance framework that is flexible, proportionate, and serves to protect data confidentiality and uphold patient privacy at all times, while facilitating research.

The NIHR-HIC programme is managed through the AHSC Research Informatics Subcommittee chaired by Professor Paul Elliott, bringing together the ICHNT IT Department, Divisional Directors, the Caldicott Guardian, the Imperial tissue bank and the NHIR HIC theme leaders to develop and oversee the implementation of a comprehensive  IT strategy for research across the AHSC.

NIHR-HIC is the beginning of the informatics infrastructure that will be required to deliver the MedCity research linkage across the five AHSCs in Southern England.  It is anticipated the new research informatics infrastructure will go live in September 2014.

 

For more information contact:

Roger Tatoud, PhD.
Senior Programme Manager
Imperial College London
St Mary’s Campus – The Bays, 2nd Entrance
South Wharf Road
London W2 1NY UK
r.tatoud@imperial.ac.uk 020 3312 2560

Healthy Volunteers for HIV Vaccine Trials Wanted

cuthivacThe Clinical Trials Centre at St. Mary’s Hospital are looking for healthy HIV NEGATIVE male and female volunteers between the ages of 18-45, who are going to be around London for 6 months to take part in a Phase I clinical trial to develop a new vaccine.

If you are interested in wanting to take part please contact Stephen on free phone 0800 358 3001 or email: hivvaccinetrial@imperial.ac.uk for more information.  Your time and travel for all visits will be reimbursed and you’ll receive up to £1100 over the course of the study.

This trial, led by Professor Robin Shattock in the Department of Medicine, forms part of the EU funded CUT’HIVAC project, which aims at assessing a new HIV vaccine strategy to prevent and control HIV infection based on transcutaneous and/or mucosal needle-free vaccination.

Study approved by Cambridge East Research Ethics Committee.

The Global School Health and Nutrition Resource Relaunched

The global school health and nutrition resource schoolsandhealth.org, administered by Partnership for Child Development (PCD), was recently re-launched to further the reach of high quality School Health and Nutrition (SHN) documents, resources and news to the SHN community.

“Improving the way news and information on the health, nutrition and education of school-age children around the world is disseminated remains as vital as ever. The new website allows quality assured, academically reviewed SHN resources, data and information to be distinguished from the multitude of information now available online; ensuring the SHN community has easy access to what they are looking for.” said PCD’s Executive Director, Lesley Drake.

schoolsandhealth.org was developed in 1998 in collaboration between: World Bank, World Food Programme, World Health Organization, UNICEF, PCD and other partners in response to a demand for a global online portal making SHN resources easily accessible to SHN interest groups, and in particular to policy makers and practitioners. The re-launched website continues to adhere to this demand; through its new and improved sections the website’s user friendliness, navigation and accessibility from internet searches is further ensured.

 

Selected New Website Features

 

 

Documents and Resource Centre:

The revitalised Documents and Resource Centre holds over an impressive 670 resources – twice as many relevant SHN relevant resources as previously displayed. These range in topic from: examples of good programming practice and policy, case studies, technical reviews, toolkits and guidelines, reports, surveys, advocacy tools and international declarations. Within the centre details including description, topic, title and author are outlined for each document allowing information to be easily viewed prior to download. Searches can also be categorized by SHN theme, language and year.
• Visit the Documents and Resource Centre

Updated Website Pages:

The website provides revamped pages for relevant school health topic areas including: helminth infections, nutrition, HIV, water, hygiene and sanitation, acute respiratory infections and malaria. Reflecting  SHN expansion, the site now encompasses an inclusive education section.

News & Events Section:

Global and country specific school health news continues to be displayed in a new appealing format through the website’s news and events section holding almost 200 diverse SHN news articles which can be easily viewed collectively as well as in detail individually.
• Visit the News and Events Section

Visit schoolsandhealth.org to view all other features and the revitalised layout.

 

Charlotte Broyd
Website and Communications Assistant
Partnership for Child Development

From the Dean of the Faculty

Dear Colleagues,

Imperial College has figured at No 4 globally in the Times Higher Education (THE) World University rankings in the Category of Clinical, Pre-Clinical and Health, a rise of one place since 2012. This is excellent news and reflects strongly on the quality of our faculty and on the sustained excellence of the research and teaching at Imperial College. So thanks to all of you for helping to deliver this remarkable achievement which clearly reflects an extraordinary body of work. Every small contribution helps – from taking extra time over a worried student to discovery of a new pathway relevant to human disease or in translating research into policy.  The ability to translate does appear to be an important theme in this category with important implications in enhancing reputation.  We have a wonderful research eco-system in the Faculty of Medicine that enables us to convert our discoveries into real benefits for patients through our partnerships in the AHSC and the AHSN.

This theme of translation is also followed through in the Life Sciences table with Harvard ranked at No 1. The Citation in THE interestingly cites Harvard’s ability to accelerate the pathway from discovery to product through the Harvard Biomedical Accelerator Fund and the capacity to rapidly move from test-tube to clinic as a key factor in its success. As we look to the future with development of Imperial West looming on the horizon, there may be important pointers for us here in terms of our translational strategy. How we develop strategically with our international partners may be key to moving further ahead in the University rankings in the future.

Professor Dermot Kelleher MD FRCPI FRCP F MedSci AGAF
Dean of the Faculty of Medicine

Partnership for Child Development August update

Dubai documentary

 

In May 2012, Partnership for Child Development (PCD) were filmed by Dubai documentary makers on their role in Ghana’s Home Grown School Feeding programme (GSFP).

The documentary series, entitled Sanad, began airing during Ramadan last month, with the GSFP featured in episode one. The series featured projects funded by philanthropic organisation Dubai Cares, which included Home Grown School Feeding programmes supported by PCD and its partners in both Ghana and Ethiopia.

In episode one, PCD’s West Africa Regional Director, Daniel Mumuni, outlined PCD’s role in the programme alongside the aims of HGSF programmes; to support child health, nutrition and education, at the same time as promoting local livelihoods.

M&E Guidance for School Health Programmes

 

As part of ongoing efforts to provide internationally-agreed guidance on how to monitor and evaluate school health programmes, the Focused Resources of Effective School Health (FRESH) partners havedeveloped Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) Guidance for School Health Programmes.

Partnership for Child Development,  alongside numerous individuals and organisations, have input support, advice, and insight into this publication over the past five years. With its set of recommended indicators, this FRESH M&E Guidance intends to help programmes in low and middle-income countries ensure their implementation is more standardised and evidence-based.

Further information on the M&E Guidance

 

Charlotte Broyd
Website and Communications Assistant
Partnership for Child Development

The Great Debate 2013 – Raising Standards in Hip and Knee Arthroplasty

On the 20th and 21st June, the MSk Lab ran the Great Debate for the second time after taking the gauntlet on from industry who had organised it in previous years. Professor Cobb is one of the founders of the meeting 7 years ago and chaired the event since its inception – so last year it was great to finally bring it in house.

The Great Debate is a two day interactive conference which gives the attendees opportunities to vote on topical issues in hip and knee arthroplasty, as well as question the faculty on controversial themes in the session debates. Last year the time of year it was held changed as well as a move of venue to The Mermaid Conference Centre. 2013 also brought some changes – the avatar/logo was given a new lease of life and breakout sessions run by industry were added each day. We had the support of 19 Industry sponsors, a 25 strong international faculty with renowned speakers joining us from; Australia, USA, Germany, Italy and the UK.

“The big issues debated this year included hip bearings, and partial knee replacements competing with top of the range total knees. In the hip bearing debate, ceramics were clear winners, although interestingly resurfacing is not dead. Almost 80% of the surgeons thought there was still a place for the procedure, and accepted the functional gains that it brought.

In the knee debate, huge interest was found in the compartmental knee approach, with most speakers expressing dissatisfaction at the joint registry and its inability to report poorly functioning but unrevised total knees”

Having almost finished dotting all the t’s and crossing all the I’s to finalise this year’s event, we may just have time for a cuppa before starting to plan The Great Debate 2014. With such good feedback – how could we not!

“I have attended three times since 2006, I think this is the best joint arthroplasty meeting in the UK”

Tweet us or follow us @Great_Debate_UK, which we will be using to try and keep some debate going, accept suggestions as to topics for discussion, and provide details of who to expect to see, where and when in 2014.

Zoe Williams
Public Engagement and Patient Involvement Manager
MSk Lab

Itchy Sneezy Wheezy update

Professor John Warner
Professor John Warner
Rachel Griffin
Rachel Griffin

The Itchy Sneezy Wheezy project, or ISW,  is a primary care led project funded by CLAHRC to develop case management of patients with chronic diseases such as asthma and allergies. ISW is coordinated and administered by Professor John Warner (Professor of Paediatrics at Imperial College) and Rachel Griffin (Children’s Advanced Nurse Practitioner – Integrated Care), who has been seconded to Imperial College by CLAHRC to run the integrated care pathways project.

ISW’s work was recently profiled in the London Evening Standard, where one parent, Mrs Blagg-Reeves, was quoted as saying:  “I’m just so glad the clinic was around. If it can help other mothers not feel like a disappointment to their child because they can’t help him or her, then that’s good.”

ISW was also shortlisted for Child Health Team of the Year in the 2013 BMJ Awards, which took place on the 9th May.

Jane Webb
Department Secretary – Paediatrics
Department of Medicine

Partnership for Child Development update

Events


Bill Gates talks school feeding with Ghanaian farmers, teachers and caterers

During his first ever visit to Ghana, Bill Gates joined the Partnership for Child Development to talk with smallholder farmers, teachers and caterers to better understand the issues and opportunities presented by Home Grown School Feeding (HGSF) programmes. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation have been supporting the development of government-led, HGSF programmes since 2009. These nationally owned programmes enable schools to procure the ingredients for their school meals from local smallholder farmers. The benefits of programmes, such as Ghana’s School Feeding Programme (GSFP), are felt by the school child and farmer alike with school children getting free nutritious hot meals whilst the farmer gets access to a regular market, providing a win-win for both education and economic development.

Find out more.

 

Dubai Cares visits Ghana

PCD recently accompanied a Dubai Cares team visit to Ghana who carried out a number of field visits to monitor and evaluate aspects of the GSFP they are supporting through PCD. This support is focused on improving the nutritional quality of food in school meals and consists of three key components: community sensitization, providing advice to farmers and a deworming programme.

 

The second annual School Health and Nutrition (SHN) course in Southeast Asia

The second annual SHN course was held in Laos between 13–20 February 2013. Hosted by the Laos Ministries of Health and Education and supported by PCD, the Japan Consortium for Global School Health Research and Mahidol University, the course trained 40 participants drawn from governments, development partners and SHN organisations from 11 Asian countries in the region.

Download course information and presentations.

Programme Implementation

 

Botswana Case Study Report launch

Botswana’s National School Feeding Programme: A Case Study and Transition Report was officially launched by the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development at a meeting in February. This was attended by the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) and PCD. Participants also agreed to a launch of the HGSF programme on 19 April 2013.

Download Botswana’s National School Feeding Programme: A Case Study.

 

Dental health and hygiene programme, Osun State, Nigeria

A total of 90 school health promoters and 966 teachers from 322 schools were trained as part of a pilot programme to improve the hygiene, dental health and nutrition practices of 90,000 children in Osun State. The programme is being implemented by the Osun State Government, in partnership with PCD and UNILEVER.

 

Nigeria’s NTD master plan launch

PCD helped to support the launch of a new five year implementation plan for the control and elimination of Neglected Tropical Diseases (NTDs) in Nigeria. The plan, which targets 10 NTDs, has an approved budget of US$307 m and will treat over 60 million people annually over the next five years.

Publications

 

Worms wisdom and wealth published

“Worms, wisdom, and wealth: Why deworming can make economic sense.” A joint article by PCD, World Bank and the University of Washington was published in Trends in Parasitology. The article examines the effects of deworming on child development, health and economic returns.

 

Are school food programmes in low-income settings sustainable? accepted for publication

A PCD paper, “Are school food programmes in low-income settings sustainable? Insights on the costs of school feeding compared to investments in primary education”, was recently accepted for publication by the Food and Nutrition Bulletin. The paper analyses the costs of school feeding and the cost relative to education expenditure and other measures of economic growth using data from high, low and middle countries.

 

Miss Charlotte Broyd
Website and Communications Assistant
School of Public Health