Orthopaedics

At Keele University, support from the School has led to a number of departmental and research advances in the field of Orthopaedics. In 2016, the ‘Arthritis Research UK Primary Care Centre’, together with clinical rheumatology partners at the Haywood Hospital, were awarded EULAR Centre of Excellence status.

PANDA-S

School funding has also supported further applications to external funders. Professor Danielle van der Windt also secured the first combined NIHR and Arthritis Research UK Programme Grant for Applied Research, with £2.6m for the ‘Maximising outcome for patients with shoulder pain: using optimal diagnostic and prognostic information to target treatment (PANDA-S)’ programme. PANDA-S aims to develop and evaluate a better approach (stratified care) to assessing the likely cause (diagnosis) and future outcome (prognosis) of shoulder problems, so that clinicians can offer optimal treatments matched to patient characteristics. 

CONTACT

The CONTACT trial is supported by the School and run across four Partner Departments (Keele University, University of Southampton, University of Nottingham, University of Oxford). This is the first CTIMP to be run by Keele CTU, and the first ever head-to-head comparison of treatments for acute gout. The main trial objective is to compare the effectiveness of two licensed drugs, which are frequently prescribed within primary care, to reduce pain from acute gout; namely low-dose Colchicine and Naproxen, with a hope to provide clear recommendations for future clinical practice. For Keele University, this study was the first step in the scaling up of their research ambition, moving them away from local single centre trials to national multicentre CTIMP studies. For the School this study demonstrates a clear drive for collaboration across partners.