Congratulations to Professor Mel Calvert who won the prestigious Josiah Mason Award for Academic Advancement and Dr Olalekan Lee Aiyegbusi who was nominated for the Florence Price award. These 'Founders Awards' are given by the University of Birmingham to celebrate the very best academic work in the University.
These successes recognise the significant contribution of their work to improve patient symptoms and quality of life. This includes research within the BTRU in Precision Cellular Therapeutics to develop a digital system to help patients and care teams monitor CAR-T Therapy.
Dr Sarah Hughes, responsible for conducting the research, said: 'We are thrilled for Mel and Lee, and delighted to see their work recognised by these prestigious awards. I am extremely proud of our team's efforts to develop a digital platform for patients who have had CAR T-cell therapy to report their symptoms and impacts on their quality of life as they receive these cutting edge treatments. This work is important because we know that the symptoms and side effects experienced by cancer patients may be underestimated by healthcare professionals and family members. Capturing this information directly from patients using electronic patient-reported outcomes (ePROs) has the potential to play an important role in guiding treatment and overall care.'