They shared their reasons for being involved in BTRU research and offered practical advice about working with patients. They also sat on a ‘Dragon’s Den’ style expert panel and provided useful feedback after listening to the researchers’ innovative pitches. Happily, they weren’t expected to invest their own money - just the benefit of their experience!
What an interesting and enlightening day! We learnt just how much work is required to translate research in the lab into clinical practice, and that it's not enough to be a dedicated scientist working on an exciting new product.
“Beyond the science, they need to think about how the new product will be delivered, safety, costs, scalability, regulatory issues, and much, much more. On top of that they will have to be able to secure regular funding through confident and persuasive presentation of their work to potential investors; we certainly saw lots of that today as they fielded questions from the dragons. Such a shame we had no money to invest.” [Evelyn Chakera].