The Directors and Executive Management Team of the INFANT Centre are delighted to announce that Christian Stafford and Josephine Studham will join the INFANT Centre in two new roles: as Head of Business Development and Head of Operations, respectively. Christian and Jo’s addition to the team is an exciting time of growth for INFANT. Prof Louise Kenny noted, “both Christian and Jo bring a wealth of experience and knowledge. Their work will expand the horizons of our centre and enable INFANT to have greater reach and impact”.

As Head of Business Development, Christian will lead and oversee the Centre commercial strategy. He will particularly focus on the development, growth and maintenance of partnerships with industry and the commercialisation of INFANT innovations to the market. He has more than 15 years’ experience in strategic and operational innovation management, research commercialisation, IP management, business development and industrial-academic research collaboration in food and life sciences in UK and Ireland. As Head of Business Development at INFANT, Christian will drive the overall commercial strategy and help promote and develop the role of Infant in delivering societal and economic impact. Christian added that he is “delighted to join INFANT and support the Centre mission of developing and delivering innovations addressing significant unmet need in maternal and infant health. The work of INFANT, the Directors and the all the team is exciting, inspirational and has significant potential to make a profound impact. I very much look forward to helping the Centre on this journey.”

Christian’s staff profile

Jo Studham will take up the role of Head of Operations from September 2016. Jo has worked in clinical research for over 25 years. She joins us from her role as Clinical Research Facility Manager at St George’s University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. As Head of Operations, she will take responsibility for the day-to-day activities of the Centre and helping to develop the centre’s operational plan. She will have oversight of all project management roles, monitoring and reporting, and will contribute to the future strategic development of the Centre. Jo stated that “In this role, I look forward to supporting the operational delivery of INFANT Centre strategy, whilst increasing the profile of INFANT both nationally and internationally. I was attracted to Infant’s mission because I strongly believe that improving health outcomes for both mothers and babies has a synergistic effect on health outcomes for all. I am really looking forward to working with and becoming a part of the INFANT Centre team.”

Jo’s staff profile

Prof Geraldine Boylan added that “both Christian and Jo possess the skills needed to effectively and efficiently deliver on the significant potential of INFANT. Their work will greatly help to ensure our work benefits women and children worldwide”. We all look forward to working with both Christian and Jo in these new roles, and warmly welcome them to the team.

Our BabyLink project is working to improve outcomes for newborn babies in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.

Seizures or fits in newborn babies are classed as a medical emergency and require urgent treatment. However, they are impossible to detect without continuous brain monitoring using EEG. Specialist expertise is required for EEG interpretation and, all too often, no such expert is on-hand in neonatal intensive care units, which can result in important brain events being missed. The INFANT Centre at UCC and Cork University Maternity Hospital has pooled its extensive database of newborn electroencephalogram (EEG) recordings and machine learning expertise with IBM’s Big Data Analytics stream processing capability to create a unique clinical decision support platform.

The directors and Executive Management Team are delighted to announce Dr Keelin O’Donoghue and Prof Jonathan Hourihane will join the INFANT Centre as Principal Investigators.

Dr O’Donoghue and Prof Hourihane’s addition to the PI team is a very exciting time for INFANT. Prof Louise Kenny noted, “both Keelin and Jonathan bring a wealth of experience and knowledge which will extend the research areas of our centre. They are experts in their fields and we are really looking forward to working together to expand the impact that INFANT can have”. Prof Geraldine Boylan added that “the appointment of these PIs will help INFANT gain even more momentum as a world-leading research centre and will further our goal of improving health outcomes for mothers and their children”.

The Vice President for Research and Innovation at UCC, Professor Anita Maguire welcomed the addition of these talented researchers to the innovative INFANT Research Centre, stating: “The complementary expertise these researchers bring to the INFANT team will further support the more rapid translation of important research to the cot-side, and support the development of solutions to unmet global needs in perinatal healthcare.”

Keelin O’Donoghue heads the multi-disciplinary pregnancy loss research group at CUMH. She is an RCOG sub-specialist in maternal and fetal medicine. She established and leads the multiple pregnancy, fetal medicine and pregnancy loss services at CUMH, and is part of the Perinatal Medicine team. Keelin took up a post as Consultant Obstetrician/Gynaecologist and Senior Lecturer at CUMH and University College Cork in 2007and in 2008, Keelin established the first Irish Masters programme in Obstetrics and Gynaecology at UCC. From 2010-2014, Keelin was Obstetric Lead on the Division of Obstetrics, Gynaecology and Neonatology at CUMH and was Clinical Director for Women and Children at Cork University Hospital from 2013-2014.  Keelin is a member of the National Working Party for the Obstetrics and Gynaecology Clinical Programme, the Clinical Advisory Group of the Institute of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, the Speciality Training Committee of the RCPI, the National Perinatal Epidemiology Centre Perinatal Mortality Group and the HSE Bereavement Care Standards Development Group. Keelin’s main research interests include prenatal diagnosis, miscarriage, pregnancy loss, stillbirth and multiple pregnancy.

Jonathan Hourihane has been Professor of Paediatrics and Child Health in University College Cork, Ireland since 2005. He is co-PI of the BASELINE birth cohort study. He has ongoing projects in the following areas: clinical and proteomic characterisation of emerging food allergy syndromes, exploration of the link between skin barrier dysfunction and systemic allergic disorders, threshold doses of food allergens, immunomodulation of established allergic responses, prevention of allergic sensitisation, including use of pre-and probiotic-enhanced infant formulae and evaluation of quality of life in food allergic children. Jonathan’s primary area of clinical and research interest is in paediatric food allergy and anaphylaxis.

We all look forward to working with both Keelin and Jonathan, and warmly welcome them to the team.

The research found that children as young as one regularly use touchscreen devices, with most toddlers handling them competently by the age of two. Instead of being unhealthy for a child, time on touchscreen devices is not dissimilar to traditional forms of interactive play.

The study found that 82 per cent of parents owned a smart device and 87 per cent of them let their child play with it. Actions such as swiping, unlocking or searching on smartphones and tablets were skills possessed by the majority of children.  Half of parents said their child could unlock the screen, 91  per cent could swipe and 64 per cent could search for features.

The report, published in the Archives of Disease in Childhood, said: “Interactive touchscreen applications offer a level of engagement not previously experienced with other forms of media and are more akin to traditional play. This opens up the potential… for both assessment of development and early intervention in high-risk children.”

Researchers and Clinicians from University College Cork (UCC) have contributed to the Lancet Stillbirth Series: Ending Preventable Stillbirths, launched globally on 19 January 2016 and published in the prestigious medical journal.  This series builds on the original Lancet Stillbirths Series published in 2011, reviews where international progress has and has not been made, and shows what steps should be done to end preventable stillbirths by 2030.

Keelin O’Donoghue, Consultant Obstetrician, and Daniel Nuzum, Healthcare Chaplain, both from the Pregnancy Loss Research Group at UCC, are among the co-authors of one of the five seminal papers in the Series.  Formed in 2012, the Pregnancy Loss Research Group led by Dr O’Donoghue is based at the Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology UCC and Cork University Maternity Hospital. Other group members Margaret Murphy and Sarah Meaney formed part of the Lancet Stillbirths High Income Countries Investigator Group that contributed to another of the Series papers.

The group are among 216 authors and advisors from more than 40 countries who have contributed to this Lancet Stillbirth Series, and present the clearest picture to date of the ongoing progress in reducing stillbirths, as well as missed opportunities, with a call to action for ending preventable stillbirths.

Every year globally, more than 2.6 million babies are stillborn. Dr Keelin O’Donoghue, Senior Lecturer UCC and Consultant Obstetrician CUMH states that “Of these 2.6 million stillbirths, 98% occur in low- and middle-income countries and almost half of all stillbirths happen during labour and birth. Most deaths result from problems that can be avoided with good maternity care such as the prevention or treatment of infections and pregnancy-related complications (e.g. high blood pressure, diabetes, or poor growth of the baby before birth.) Efforts to prevent stillbirth need to form part of normal healthcare of women and babies”. The series highlights that most stillbirths could be prevented during pregnancy, labour and birth, and that improvements in global maternity care will also prevent the deaths of mothers and newborn babies and ultimately improve child development.

In the face of the global burden of stillbirth, the impact of stillbirth can sometimes be overlooked in high-income countries such as Ireland. Daniel Nuzum, Healthcare Chaplain CUMH, comments that “Stillbirth is a tragedy for families and can have long lasting psychological, social, spiritual and financial impact. How people are cared for at the time of their loss can influence their overall experience and wellbeing. Having respectful maternity services that include good quality bereavement care can reduce the negative impact for parents and families. Although the impact of stillbirth mostly affects women and their families, caregivers, communities, and health services are also affected.”

Figures presented in the Lancet Series show that Ireland now ranks 17^th out of 186 countries in the world with a stillbirth rate of 2.7 stillbirths per 1,000 total births after 28 weeks of pregnancy. The National Perinatal Epidemiology Centre’s 2013 report showed that from 69,146 births in Ireland, 301 infants were stillborn. https://www.ucc.ie/en/npec/publications/. It is important to remember that this loss of life has a huge impact on families and caregivers and places a significant burden on both maternity services and wider society. The Lancet Ending Preventable Stillbirth Series calls upon all high-income countries to set and meet targets to close equity gaps for parents and use data to track and prevent stillbirths.

Follow NPEC on Twitter: @NPEC_UCC

HASHTAG: #endstillbirths

Minister for Skills, Research and Innovation, Damien English TD, announced Professor Geraldine Boylan and Professor Louise Kenny as the Science Foundation Ireland Joint Researchers of the Year 2015 at the SFI Science Summit in recognition of their global leadership in reducing the burden of disease and disability associated with the period just before and after birth. The SFI Researcher of the Year award “recognises the accomplishments of an SFI funded researcher who has contributed significantly to the Irish research community in their career and/or who has achieved exceptional research outputs in the last 12 months”.

This award was a first in two respects: the first time it has been given as a duo, but also the first time it has ever been award to a woman. Professor Mark Ferguson, Director General of Science Foundation Ireland and Chief Scientific Adviser to the Government of Ireland, added: “It is particularly apt that they are the first female recipients; INFANT is unique in that it’s being led by two women and encouraging junior female faculty at the centre is a priority for both of them.”

Presenting the award to the Professors, Minister English said: “Professors Boylan and Kenny are leading the way in perinatal care and research and they thoroughly deserve to receive this award for the outstanding work they have done and continue to do.  The Professors and their team at the INFANT Centre in Cork are developing solutions to address some of the most commonplace complications of pregnancy and the most significant problems for new-born babies.  Both of the Professors bring insights from their clinical practice to research, translate scientific advances to the bedside and cotside and are opening up markets for companies who now appreciate the scale of unmet clinical need.”  

Accepting the award, Professor Geraldine Boylan and Professor Louise Kenny said: “Every single day, somewhere in the world over 800 young women die as a direct result of pregnancy or childbirth, and in the same 24 hour period over 15,000 babies will be stillborn or will die within days of birth. Many millions more who survive will live with long-term disability. Perinatal research has lagged behind other research areas both in terms of investment and consequently in terms of progress. The support of Science Foundation Ireland, University College Cork, and the Irish government is helping our outstanding team at INFANT to reverse this trend.  It is hugely satisfying to see the results of our work making a difference to real women and babies’ lives on a daily basis.”

The Professors paid credit to the SFI for ‘bucking the trend’ and supporting INFANT. Thanking the INFANT team, the professors noted that, “Babies are born anytime day or night, on holidays, weekends, birthdays,” she said. “It is very likely that at this very moment one of our team is in the maternity hospital, maybe talking to a parent, possibly getting some consent for research, possibly taking [a blood sample] from a baby who has been delivered and is in a critical condition.” In tandem with this, they both paid special thanks to the parents of babies who take part in studies: “their altruism and selflessness is inspiring and deeply humbling for us”.

Both Louise and Geraldine are passionate about attracting women to science and hope that their success will  inspire young women contemplating a career in science or medicine. Kenny highlighted the benefits of working together with Boylan to run INFANT. They have been close friends and colleagues for nearly a decade and have co-directed for the last two years. “Directing a research centre can be very challenging and can occasionally be very lonely,” Prof Kenny said, “I am blessed every day by being able to manage the INFANT centre with one of my closest friends and colleagues. I can say it is often challenging but never lonely”.

PRIMARY SCHOOLS

INFANT researchers will be visiting schools in Cork with Blood & Brains – a mix of the “Bloody Detectives: Mystery Molecules” hands-on workshop and “Electric Brains: Mind Control” demonstration.

Find out what blood is made of, solve mysteries of hidden clues and protect the evidence!

Discover how these mystery molecules are helping us save lives of mums and babies.

THEN

See your brain light up as it is full of electricity! Discover how it works and learn how we can trick it!

Your brain operates everything in your body: it can move your own arm, but can you use it to move someone ELSE?

Visits are free but must be booked in advance via The Cork Science Festival 

SECONDARY SCHOOLS

For second level, join the INFANT researchers at CIT Blackrock Castle Observatory for their second level schools programme. Meet the scientists and engineers working right here in Cork in the Science Foundation Ireland STEMists area!

Visits must be booked in advance with CIT Blackrock Castle Observatory 

CAREER TALKS

INFANT volunteers with Smart Futures

If you’d like an INFANT researcher to visit your school, contact our outreach officer.

The 9th International Conference on Brain Monitoring and Neuroprotection in the Newborn will be held from 1–3 October 2015 in Cork, Ireland.

This conference will provide a state of the art forum for the most current and important research in Newborn Brain Monitoring and Neuroprotection.

With an international faculty of key opinion leaders, this conference provides a unique opportunity to hear brain monitoring and neuroprotection discussed comprehensively at a time when both fields are growing rapidly. Accompanying update workshops are designed to guide and provide a unique training experience. The Programme Committee are currently reviewing abstracts for inclusion in the main programme. We are delighted to have received a record number of submissions for 2015 and look forward to hearing these presentations.

Registrations are invited from professionals from all areas of expertise: neonatologists, neurophysiologists, neonatal nurses, research scientists, paediatric neurologists, allied health professionals, and more.Registration is now open and we would invite you to register. Early Bird Registration closed on 31 July.

The 9th International Conference on Brain Monitoring and Neuroprotection in the Newborn will be held at the Fota Island Resort. This is a premium destination hotel and conference facility located in the middle of lush green country side surrounded by world class golf courses, minutes outside Cork City which is served by an international airport.

This article was originally published on September 7th, 2015. For World Preeclampsia Day, May 22nd, 2017, read about INFANT’s research in preeclampsia prediction. 

Award for Preeclampsia Research

Ground-breaking work on preeclampsia, a life threatening complication of late pregnancy, has earned researchers in Cork a major award from the American Heart Association.

The international award is a first for Irish researchers and also a first for pregnancy research.  The scientific study has been announced as top paper for 2014 in the category of clinical science in Hypertension, the journal of the American Heart Association. The research was carried out by INFANT (The Irish Centre for Fetal and Neonatal Translation Research) based in UCC and the Cork University Maternity Hospital.

The SCOPE (Screening for Pregnancy Endpoints) research is led in Ireland by Louise Kenny, Professor of Obstetrics at University College Cork, Director of the INFANT Centre and Consultant Obstetrician and Gynaecologist at Cork University Maternity Hospital.

The SCOPE project is an international study that aims to develop screening tests to predict and prevent the major complications of late pregnancy, such as pre-eclampsia. Pregnancy can be a dangerous time for millions of women worldwide: pre-eclampsia claims the lives of more than 70,000 women and over 500,000 infants every year.

Prof Kenny explains the reasons behind the study, “it’s about saving the lives of mothers and their babies: that’s why we get up every morning, that’s why this is so important.”

Life-Threatening Complications

This potentially deadly disorder could be prevented with the development of a test that could identify women who are at greatest risk, and the SCOPE study aims to do just this. It will develop an early pregnancy screening test that will offer first time mothers accurate risk assessment. The intensity of prenatal care can then be matched to each woman’s personal risk profile: preventative therapies can be offered if they are needed.  Professor Louise Kenny said, “Our goal is to save the lives of affected mums and babies by reducing and eventually preventing the life-threatening complications associated with pre-eclampsia.”

The American Heart Association award is for the group’s first major publication. In this study, 75 putative biomarkers of interest were investigated. None, alone nor in combination, provided a robust enough test, providing further support for Prof  Kenny’s work to develop novel biomarkers specific for pregnancy using the new technology.

Predicting Problems

A follow on study called IMPROvED is recruiting pregnant women in the Cork University Maternity Hospital  and across Europe, contributing to one of the world’s largest and most detailed “biobanks” with samples given by the mums and babies.

“The next phase will be to combine clinical information and our pregnancy specific biomarkers to develop the most effective system for predicting problems in pregnancy. The final step is to turn this into a prototype blood test” says Louise. “Hopefully mothers and babies should benefit from the new screening test within the next five to ten years.”

“Fantastic Achievement”

The researchers invite first time mums who are less than 17 weeks pregnant to get involved in the study  – if interested contact the IMPROvED team by email at improved@ucc.ie

Graham Love, the Chief Executive of the Health Research Board who funded Professor Kenny’s initial involvement in SCOPE said:

“This is a fantastic achievement by Prof Kenny and her research team. It’s both a testament to the quality of Ireland’s health researchers that they can win such a prestigious international award, and also a validation of the HRB’s efforts to foster a dynamic culture of research and innovation at the heart of our health care services.”

Prof Kenny’s original Clinician Scientist Award was then the largest grant made to a single project in Ireland at €1.7 million.  It enabled over 1,600 Irish mothers and babies to participate in the SCOPE project and involved 5,700 first time pregnant women in four countries.