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Research platform to transform
treatment of traumatic brain injury
A £9.5m research platform announced by MRC today is set to transform the way survivors of traumatic
brain injury are diagnosed and treated in the UK.
Traumatic brain injury, or TBI, is a leading cause of death and disability
in people under 40 in the UK. It can cause a range of serious and lifelong
health issues for people who survive, including dementia, epilepsy and
poor mental health.
Until now, data collected by individual research projects investigating
TBI has rarely been used outside the original study, even though it
provides a potentially rich resource for understanding TBI and advancing
its clinical care.
This lack of coordinated use of data has slowed progress in treating and
caring for people experiencing TBI.
Bringing together experts
To address this an initiative to establish a UK-wide research platform,
UK-TBI REpository and data PORTal Enabling discoveRy (TBI-REPORTER),
led by the University of Cambridge is being jointly funded by:
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the Medical Research Council (MRC)
the National Institute for Health and Care Research
the Ministry of Defence
Alzheimer’s Research UK
TBI-REPORTER will bring together leading experts from across the UK to
enable research into TBI, including concussion, and across the lifespan
from children to older ages.
It will also support research in previously under studied populations,
including:
• prisoners
• homeless people
• victims of domestic violence
An ambitious platform
Project lead Professor David Menon, Head of the Division of Anaesthesia
at the University of Cambridge, said:
It is a privilege to lead this ambitious platform, which brings
together a breadth of experts and draws on the lived experience of
TBI survivors and their families, to improve care of traumatic brain
injury.
We also believe that our work, in combination with that of
international partners, will re-energise drug development in TBI and
deliver new treatments for patients.
Better coordination of data
To do this, TBI-REPORTER will collaborate with Health Data Research
UK. It will build on successes of wider NHS and population-based UK
research, such as UK Biobank and Dementias Platform UK, to bring
together rich datasets from existing studies in TBI.
It will also coordinate research data collection and clinical studies
going forward. All of this will be made available to UK and international
researchers to accelerate research in TBI and its impact on lifelong
health.
The hope is that this will lead to more people being treated effectively
as doctors are able to better predict how a certain injury is likely to
affect a patient with TBI and offer them individualised care.
Working with industry
The platform will also assist academic and industrial partners to
develop better diagnostic tests and treatments for TBI.
To facilitate this, the TBI-REPORTER platform will establish a network
of research-ready NHS specialist neuroscience hospitals primed to trial
innovative ways of diagnosing and treating TBI.
Brain injury survivor James Piercy said:
As one of the estimated 1 million people living with the results of a
traumatic brain injury, I welcome this new initiative which promises
to improve diagnosis and treatment of TBI: the ‘hidden disability’.
Unique scientific strengths
Professor John Iredale, Executive Chair of the MRC, part of UKRI, added:
We recognise the devastating impacts traumatic brain injury can have
for its survivors and those who care for them, and are determined to
improve the status quo.
This award will capitalise on the UK’s unique scientific strengths to
see research into TBI accelerated on a scale not seen before.
This will lead to the discoveries we need to give survivors of TBI all
around the world a much more hopeful future.
A collaborative approach
Dr Susan Kohlhaas, Director of Research at Alzheimer’s Research UK,
said:
Over a million people in the UK are living with long-term symptoms of
a traumatic brain injury, and evidence suggests that exposure to such
an injury can increase dementia risk.
At Alzheimer’s Research UK, we believe it is only by bringing people
from different backgrounds together through collaborative approaches
that we’ll begin to solve the major challenges in treatment and
diagnosis of TBIs.
Improving treatment and health outcomes
The TBI-REPORTER programme will be fundamental in improving our
understanding of how brain injury contributes to dementia risk so we
can prevent dementia in the future.
Secretary of State for Science, Innovation and Technology Chloe Smith
said:
Platform coordination
Traumatic brain injuries are a leading cause of death and disability
in people under 40 in the UK and survivors often endure a lifetime of
physical, emotional, and cognitive challenges.
This funding will bring together leading experts and support studies
into the long-term consequences of traumatic brain injuries, allowing
researchers to identify patterns and develop tailored treatments, with
the potential of saving and massively improving the lives of those
with such injuries. It is yet another example of how the UK’s science
sector is improving treatment and health outcomes for Britons across
the country.
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TBI-REPORTER represents a collaboration of leading institutions from
across the UK, and will be coordinated by:
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University of Cambridge
University of Glasgow
The University of Sheffield
Imperial College London
Swansea University
It also includes close engagement with the public, patients, and their
families through the United Kingdom Acquired Brain Injury Forum
(UKABIF).
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