Research Showcase event celebrates world-leading research

20 September 2023 (Last updated: 26 Sep 2023 11:05)

ENT UK’s Research Showcase event held earlier this month in London was a huge success, with many excellent presentations and an impressive demonstration of the first-class research being undertaken by our members and within our specialty. Alongside the presentations from our Research Society, attendees were treated to an opportunity to hear about the work and achievements of the ENT UK Foundation Awards recipients and the Rowena Ryan Awards 2023 finalists. These awards covered a broad range of categories, showcasing the accomplishments of both trainees, SAS doctors and consultants.

Helen Cocks, ENT UK President-elect said:

“An excellent day showcasing research across the speciality, both original research and high-quality audit projects. It was good to hear of research that has the possibility of future translation into clinical practice, excellent education initiatives and patient centred projects. It was particularly good to hear outcome of research that has had funding from the ENTUK Foundation, showing the benefit of such opportunities for our patient group.”

Nirmal Kumar, ENT UK Foundation Chair said:

“We were delighted to hear from a wide range of researchers representing the depth and breadth of otolaryngology (ENT). The themes of sustainability, wellbeing and patient engagement were highlights. The future of our specialty is bright!”

The exciting event confirmed ENT UK’s commitment to supporting and encouraging world-leading research included its new strategy ‘Inspiring Excellence and Shaping the Future’.

ENT UK Foundation Awards

The ENT UK Foundation is the philanthropic and fundraising arm of ENT UK, with a mission to invest in the specialty and facilitate global innovation, thereby improving ENT healthcare for all. This is the Foundation’s third year, but already it was able to announce a large host of successful candidates, whose innovative projects and proposals will now receive Foundation funding.

ENT UK Foundation Research Grants

Congratulations to the recipients of an ENT UK Foundation Research Grant 2023:

• Mitanshi Luhana - ‘Assessment of impact of hearing loss in presbycusis patients using quality of life questionnaire’
• Thomas Hampton - ‘Exposure of new-borns in the Neonatal Unit to ototoxic insults; aminoglycosides and noise: an observational study in Blantyre, Malawi (Noise for Neonates)’
• Andrew Williamson - ‘The IReC consensus document for salvage head and neck surgery’
• Daniel Michalik - ‘Novel nasal biomarkers for Alzheimer's Dementia’
• Rishi Shukla - ‘Multi-centre evaluation of ARTISS™ fibrin sealant to evaluate safe-transition to drainless hemithyroidectomy and day-case surgery’
• Wanding Yang - ‘Development and Evaluation of Thyroid Cancer Patient Decision Aid’
• Soo Oh - ‘Sustainable Utilisation of Surgical Instruments in ENT Operating Theatres: Development of a Web-Based Platform for Customised ENT Surgical Instrument Selection’
• Noora Althawadi - ‘Patient-reported symptom appraisal for low risk two-week-wait head and neck cancer referrals - a qualitative study’
• Kristijonas Milinis - ‘Development of imaged-guided transoral robotic surgery using upconversion nanoparticles’
• BSO - ‘The Creation of a National Tympanoplasty database’
• Paramita Baruah - ‘Time to ‘RAGE’ against necrotising otitis externa in diabetes’
• Ying Ki Lee - ‘From Text to Insights: Identifying Differences in Clinicopathological Features and Molecular Testing of Aggressive Variants of Thyroid Cancer using Natural Language Processing’
• Thomas Khan-White - ‘Retrospective cohort study investigating the effects of CT-defined sarcopenia and systemic inflammation on survival in patients with hypopharyngeal and advanced stage laryngeal squamous cell carcinomas’
• Liam Lee - ‘Enhancing Patient Engagement and Outcome Measurement in ENT Care Through Accessible Digital Solution’
• Dimitrios Spinos - ‘Standardised Simulation-Facilitated Cortical Mastoidectomy Training’
• Ravina Tanna - ‘Trans-nasal Oesophagoscopy (TNO) – UK Multidisciplinary Consensus Guidance for Training and Integrated Service Delivery’
• Stephen Bennett - ‘A comparison of the bacterial localisation site and inflammatory profile associated with Staphylococcus aureus strains in chronic rhinosinusitis and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease’
• James Schuster-Bruce - ‘An app-based study evaluating hearing behaviours amongst nightclubbers’
• Thuduvage Sanjeewanie - ‘Technology Assisted Education for Medical Students and Junior Doctors’
• Ngan Ta - ‘Are we listening? – A mixed methodology study into Trainees’ Perspectives of Core Surgical Training’
• Solomon Pudi - ‘Exploring the causes of differential attainment in IMG doctors’

ENT UK Foundation Education Grants

And congratulation go to the recipients of an ENT UK Foundation Education Grant 2023:

• Doreen Nakku - ‘Feasibility of primary school ear and hearing screening program’
• Ishika Kamat - ‘Developing tele-training for remote sharing of co-produced ENT-Head and Neck Imaging educational materials, with impact, to multi-disciplinary healthcare professionals (HCP) in low-resource countries’
• Jonathan Lee - ‘An expert consensus process to establish a minimum acceptable dataset for remote otological assessment in the UK’
• Rujuta Roplekar Bance - ‘Education and Training support for the ENTUK National Mentoring Scheme hosted by WENTS UK’
• Joshua Michaels - ‘An AOT FRCS Podcast’

ENT UK Foundation Andrew Foster Leadership Grant

This year's ENT UK Foundation Award grants included a special leadership-focused award in honour of founding Foundation Committee member Andrew Foster, who sadly passed away in March.  Congratulations to Anna Slovick who won this prestigious award for the development of The Women in ENT Surgery Foundation in Leadership Course. 

The Rowena Ryan Awards

The winners of this year’s Rowena Ryan Awards were announced at the Research Showcase. The Rowena Ryan Awards are designed to celebrate excellence within trainee-led audit, research and training initiatives.   

Congratulations to Jeremy Lavy who was awarded the Best Trainee Nominated Trainer Award and Vasant Oswal who was awarded the Life-time Trainer Award. 

Jeremy said:

“Thank you so much. I am honoured to receive the award especially as I remember Rowena Ryan well sitting on the Specialist Training Committee together for a number of years.”

Vasant said:

"I am deeply honoured to have received the Rowena Ryan Lifetime Trainer Award.  Reflecting on my own training days in the 1960s, I realised how much our profession has evolved.  As I embark on my sixty-third year in the field of ENT, I find great fulfilment in continuing to actively participate in online training. Teaching our trainees not only imparts knowledge but also keeps us, the trainers, abreast of the latest developments in our field.  My wife Nirmala and I extend our best wishes for the ongoing success of ENT UK, the ENT UK Foundation, and all those involved in advancing the field of Otolaryngology."

After hearing short presentations from the finalists, the following winners were announced:

• Best Trainee-Led Audit: Socioeconomic and ethnic disparities associated with access to cochlear implantation for severe to profound hearing loss: a multicentre audit of 6,236 UK adults - Chloe Swords
• Best Trainee-Led Research: Challenges of shared decision making in thyroid cancer: A systematic review and development of thyroid cancer patient concerns inventory - Wanding Yang
• Best Trainee-Led Teaching / Training: Developing a Nationally-Approved Trauma Course for ENT - Alex Ashman
• Best SAS-Led Audit, Research or Training: Curved Nag forceps - a novel design - Umesh Nagalotimath
• Best Overseas Trainee-Led Audit, Research or Training: An audit of laboratory and radiologic investigations during evaluation of Bell`s paryalisi in the emergency department - Mustafa Rehan
• Best Young Consultant-Led Audit, Research or Training: Leading research as a young consultant: supporting the next generation and improving patient care - Emma Stapleton

Wanding said:

“What a great honour to win the Rowena Ryan Award for best trainee-led research on research for thyroid cancer patients! I’m extremely grateful for the support.”

Emma said:

“Thank you ENT UK for today’s excellent Research Showcase at The Royal Society of Medicine.  It was a fantastic day and I was honoured to leave with the Rowena Ryan award for Best Young Consultant Led Research.”

The Paper Knife Award was awarded to Stephen Roberston for his presentation ‘Are patient leaflets too hard to read? - A review of ENTUK condition leaflets’.

Stephen said:

It was an honour to win the Rowena Ryan Paper Knife award at the ENT UK Research Showcase for our public health project. Massive thank you to my supervisor Helen Cocks for everything she’s done!”

Many thanks to Ambu, Carleton Medical, DP Medical, ICU Medical, Sheffmed and Tympa Health for their sponsorship of the Rowena Ryan Awards.

BOARS prizes

The British Otorhinolaryngology and Allied Sciences Research Society (BOARS) section featured a number of free paper presentations alongside an inspiring keynote address from speaker Thomas Hummel on research in Olfactology, the advances that have been made and potential future avenues of research to explore.  The winners were as follows:

• Sumrit Bola: Best Oral Presentation Senior (Angel James Prize) for ‘Longitudinal study of circulating tumour DNA in Head and Neck patients to aid decision making post-treatment’
• Marina Forbes: Best Oral Presentation Junior Award for ‘Memory screening in older adults attending NHS hearing aid assessment appointments: a clinical feasibility study’.
• Madeline Gadd: Best Poster Presentation Award

Stuart Winter, BOARS Council member said:

“Really good day of presentations at the ENT UK BOARS meeting. Congratulations to Sumrit Bola for a fantastic presentation and award for a great presentation.”

Congratulations once more to all the winners and many thanks to the speakers, attendees, organisers and our exhibitors, Glenmark and ICU Medical for making this such an exciting and successful event.