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Dr Ed Roddy’s clinical trial ‘CONTACT’ was awarded ‘Jewels in the Crown’ status at this year’s British Society for Rheumatology (‘BSR’) conference, which took place in Birmingham last week. The conference brings together over 2,000 delegates from 50 countries which aims to showcase the latest developments and advances in rheumatology.

Only three top-scoring abstracts submitted to the conference receive the ‘Jewels in the Crown’ status, with each individual going on to present their research in the conference’s most prestigious key-note plenary session.

Dr Roddy is a Reader in Rheumatology at the Research Institute (‘RI’) and an Honorary Consultant Rheumatologist at the Haywood Hospital. His research interests embrace epidemiological studies and trials which focus on improving treatments for patients with musculoskeletal disease, foot pain and osteoarthritis, and gout.

The presentation, entitled ‘An open-label randomised pragmatic trial comparing naproxen and low-dose colchicine for the treatment of acute gout in primary care: the CONTACT trial’, summarised the clinical trial ‘CONTACT’, which was funded by the NIHR School for Primary Care Research. The research compared the two most commonly used treatments of gout, showing that that naproxen (an ant-inflammatory drug) should be the first-line treatment for attacks of gout in primary care.

The conference aims to unite and provide support to every rheumatology professional by promoting the dissemination of best practice and providing extensive networking opportunities with peers from across the globe. Professor Elaine Hay, Director of the Research Institute for Primary Care and Health Sciences commented “to be awarded the ‘Jewels in the Crown’ status at such a prestigious conference is a huge accolade for Dr Roddy and his research team, and is a great recognition of the important work that we do within the RI to improve patient care within primary care.”

Further details of the conference can also be found online