News 

Dr Sathish Paramasivan from ENT Surgery has had his PhD conferred from The University of Adelaide and has received a Dean's Commendation for Doctoral Thesis Excellence. His thesis, on “The Host-Microbe Interface in Chronic Rhinosinusitis” was supervised by Professor PJ Wormald and Associate Professor Sarah Vreugde. During his studies Sathish was supported by an Australian Postgraduate Award, a Bertha Sudholz Research Scholarship and an Academic Surgeon Scientist Research Scholarship from the Garnett Passe and Rodney Williams Memorial Foundation..

Professor Sandra Peake, Director of Intensive Care Medicine at The Queen Elizabeth Hospital and Chair of the Australian and New Zealand Intensive Care Society Clinical Trials Group, and collaborators from across Australia have received a 2 year, $2,335,540 grant from the Australian Government’s Medical Research Future Fund (MRFF) to conduct the “Australasian Resuscitation In Sepsis Evaluation Fluids or Vasopressors in Emergency Department Sepsis trial (ARISE Fluids)", a multicentre, randomised, clinical trial. Professor Peake is the Chief Investigator. All emergency departments in South Australian public hospitals will be invited to participate in the trial with at least 50 participating sites across Australia and New Zealand. ARISE Fluids will recruit 1000 patients..

Dr Clementine Labrosciano was awarded a Dean’s Commendation for Doctoral Thesis Excellence for her thesis titled “Readmissions in Australian Patients with Cardiovascular Disease”. She completed her PhD at The University of Adelaide under the supervision of Professor John Beltrame and A/Prof Rosanna Tavella in the Translational Vascular Function Research Collaborative. Clementine is currently working as a research coordinator on the CADOSA Registry at TQEH and RAH. Clementine says “I would like to thank my peers and supervisors at the BHI for their support during my journey. I feel privileged to have worked with such wonderful people in the Basil Hetzel Institute community"..

Congratulations to Professor PJ Wormald (ENT Surgery) on being awarded one of only 12 National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Investigator Grants in South Australia. 237 Leadership and Emerging Leadership Fellows received funding in the Investigator Grant scheme, the largest NHMRC scheme. Professor Wormald’s 5 year Leadership grant, valued at $2.36M, is titled “From bench to bedside: A new treatment for Chronic Rhinosinusitis” and commences in January 2021..

Dr Stephanie Fong has been awarded her PhD in addition to a Dean's Commendation for Doctoral Thesis Excellence. Her PhD thesis title was "Bacteriophage therapy for chronic rhinosinusitis: Targeting Pseudomonas aeruginosa biofilms" and she was supervised by Professor PJ Wormald and Associate Professor Sarah Vreugde (ENT Surgery). She was supported by a joint scholarship from The Hospital Research Foundation and The University of Adelaide. Stephanie is currently in the second year of specialist training in ENT Surgery at The Queen Elizabeth Hospital..

Two of the three Diabetes SA grants announced on Friday 1 May were awarded to researchers based at the Basil Hetzel Institute, The Queen Elizabeth Hospital. Each grant is valued at $100,000 over two years. Dr David Jesudason is the Director of Diabetes and Endocrinology at The Queen Elizabeth Hospital and has 20 years of experience as an endocrinologist. He is passionate about improving the care of people with Type 1 and Type 2 Diabetes both in metropolitan Adelaide as well as rural South Australia. His project is titled "Addressing life threatening ketoacidosis associated with sodium-glucose cotransporter 2 inhibitors (SGLT2i) and key antidiabetic medicines". Dr Cher-Rin Chong is an NHMRC Peter Doherty Biomedical Early Career Fellow in the Cardiovascular Pathophysiology and Therapeutics Group at the Basil Hetzel Institute, TQEH. Her project is titled "For a novel strategy for cardiovascular protection in type 2 diabetes". Read more about these projects in the May edition of the BHI Winning News..

BHI Virology Group leader Dr Branka Grubor-Bauk is coordinating a team of scientists in a new project that aims to discover more about the immunity of patients who have recovered from COVID-19. More details can be found in this story on The Hospital Research Foundation website..

Three of the nine research projects that received funding from The Hospital Research Foundation, in an announcement made earlier this week, involve researchers based at the Basil Hetzel Institute, TQEH. Professor Mike Roberts, Director of the Therapeutic Research Centre, and three TQEH collaborators - Dr David Jesudason, Director of Endocrinology and Diabetes, Dr Emily Meyer, consultant endocrinologist and Dr Venkatesan Thiruvenkatarajan, Staff Specialist Anaesthetist, have a project that aims to prevent complications for Type 2 diabetes sufferers who are undergoing surgery. In addition to this grant, two early career researchers also have received THRF funding: Dr Katharina Richter, Surgical Science Research Group, has a project that aims to prevent infections associated with mesh implants in hernia surgery while Dr Rob Bryant, Inflammatory Bowel Disease Research Group, is investigating diet strategies for patients with ulcerative colitis. Each of the 1 year grants is valued at up to $130,000. You can read more about these projects here. [photo L-R: Professor Mike Roberts, Dr Kati Richter, Dr Rob Bryant]..