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Month: October 2025

Trial offers new hope to patients with rare skin cancer

Written by Louise Stanley on . Posted in Cancer outcomes, Clinical trials, Experimental medicine.

Researchers at BHP founder-members University Hospitals Birmingham have contributed to new findings showing that patients with Cutaneous (skin) T-cell Lymphoma (CTCL) experienced improved overall survival when treated with mogamulizumab, known by its brand name POTELIGEO.

CTCL is a rare type of cancer that begins in the white blood cells and affects the skin, causing rashes and slightly raised or scaly round patches. The most common types are mycosis fungoides and Sézary syndrome, with around 150 people diagnosed in the UK each year.

Individual’s experiences with CTCL can vary wildly – many people experience only a mild form that is not life-threatening and can be managed for years, while a smaller number develop a more serious form. Treatments either target the skin directly, using creams, light therapy, or radiotherapy, or are given as tablets or injections that circulate in the blood and work throughout the body.

POTELIGEO (mogamulizumab) is a prescription medicine given by injection into a vein and is used to treat mycosis fungoides or Sézary syndrome in adults whose disease has returned or who have not responded to at least one other treatment (oral or injectable).

Now in its tenth year, the PROCLIPI Study is the largest international study of its kind, involving 2,547 patients across 19 countries. It collects information on tests, scans, treatments, quality of life, and survival from CTCL patients, with the aim of developing a tool (known as a prognostic index) to predict outcomes for people with the disease.

The latest research confirmed that patients with advanced-stage disease treated with POTELIGEO experienced improved overall survival, with a median overall survival of 64 months compared to 54 months for patients who did not receive the treatment.

Professor Julia Scarisbrick, Consultant Dermatologist at UHB and Chief Investigator, said: “The PROCLIPI Study demonstrates the power of global collaboration in rare diseases. By bringing together data from across the world, we can generate insights that simply wouldn’t be possible in isolation.

“We are proud to coordinate this initiative here in Birmingham in partnership with Prof Kim at Stanford University, California, as we’re working to build rigorous scientific evidence while giving patients and their families a better understanding of what long-term survival looks like.”

Alexandra Mars, a 51-year-old patient at UHB’s Queen Elizabeth Hospital took part in the study, and said: “I have had tumour mycosis fungoides for over 10 years. I was most recently treated with mogamulizumab for two years and had no significant side effects. It appears to have put my disease to sleep, and I have not been on any medication since February. It is amazing to finally be able to have a break from treatment, which is so tiring, and not have to think about this disease.”

Due to the rarity of CTCL and its wide variation in presentation and progression, enrolling patients in clinical trials can be challenging. Despite these difficulties, growing evidence is helping doctors understand which treatments may be most beneficial.

Top rating for Birmingham’s NIHR Integrated Clinical Academic Training programme

Written by Louise Stanley on . Posted in Birmingham Health Partners.

The Integrated Clinical Academic Training (ICAT) programme led by BHP founder-member the University of Birmingham, has been rated joint top alongside the University of Oxford.

Birmingham’s ICAT programme is one of 36 across the country, with its NIHR funding complemented by posts supported by fellow Birmingham Health Partners member organisations. It provides opportunities for medical and dental graduates to have dedicated research time alongside their clinical training and NHS commitments and is critical to developing the future clinical research workforce, supporting clinicians to pursue research interests alongside clinical practice.

The University excelled in the recent NIHR funding competition, being awarded 28 Academic Clinical Fellow posts and 13 Academic Clinical Lecturer posts, for the period 2026 and 2027.

“We are proud to be one of the largest of the 36 NIHR ICAT programmes in the country, with 116 current trainees, ranging from pre-doctoral Academic Clinical Fellows to consultant level, postdoctoral Birmingham Health Partners award holders. Our relationships with NHS trusts across the region through BHP stand us apart from many of the other ICAT programmes and this partnership is integral to building regional research leadership capacity,” said Professor Kristien Boelaert, ICAT Academic Lead and Professor of Endocrinology at the University.

Earlier this year, the Medical Schools Council highlighted a trend in declining numbers of clinical academics and called for intervention to safeguard the future of medical research and education. The Government’s 10 Year Health plan recognises the importance of embedding research across healthcare to drive reform and attracting early career clinicians to academia is essential to increase those numbers.

Commenting on the importance of Birmingham’s contribution, Professor Boelaert explained: “It’s not just that we have an impressive number of posts here in Birmingham – our career development initiatives, research culture and peer support activities make up the full package. Our Research Retreat was also highlighted as very beneficial, along with outstanding feedback via our trainee experience survey.”

Since Birmingham’s ICAT Programme launched in 2015, 55 of our 86 NIHR Academic Clinical Fellows (64%) have progressed to clinical research training fellowships or other academic posts and 55 of 73 our NIHR and locally-funded Clinical Lecturers have progressed to senior academic positions (75%), including 17 as research-active consultants.

Find out more about our programmes:

  • BHP Starter Fellowships, allowing individuals to start their research career providing cost to cover one year’s salary to undertake a Master’s by Research
  • Clinical Academic Research Partnerships (CARP), to support individuals continue their research careers while delivering clinical service providing salary funding for two programmed activities (PAs) – or 8 hours per week – of protected research time for two years
  • New Consultant Scheme, providing salary funding for two programmed activities (PAs) – or 8 hours per week – of protected research time for three years
  • BHP Clinician Scientist, 50:50 appointments providing an academic consultant post linked with one of our NHS trusts to develop individuals as successful independent clinical researchers

BHP’s 2026 training programmes open for applications

Written by Louise Stanley on . Posted in Birmingham Health Partners.

BHP’s 2026 training programmes open for applications

The next round of recruitment for BHP’s training and development programmes is now underway, with the clinical-academic training team accepting applications until Monday 19 January 2026.

Giving all healthcare staff the opportunity to undertake research for patient benefit is essential for improving patient care and developing NHS services. BHP is proud to provide a route into research for NHS staff at all career stages through a series of tailored training opportunities and fellowships:

  • BHP Starter Fellowships, allowing individuals to start their research career providing cost to cover one year’s salary to undertake a Master’s by Research
  • Clinical Academic Research Partnerships (CARP), to support individuals continue their research careers while delivering clinical service providing salary funding for two programmed activities (PAs) – or 8 hours per week – of protected research time for two years
  • New Consultant Scheme, providing salary funding for two programmed activities (PAs) – or 8 hours per week – of protected research time for three years
  • BHP Clinician Scientist, 50:50 appointments providing an academic consultant post linked with one of our NHS trusts to develop individuals as successful independent clinical researchers

BHP’s Managing Director Professor Lorraine Harper will host two online information and Q&A sessions on our programmes as follows:

  • CARP, New Consultant scheme and BHP Clinician Scientist: Monday 27 October 2025, 11.30-12.30pm
  • BHP Starter Fellowship: Tuesday 4 November 2025, 9.30-10.30am

To receive the joining link, please email icat@contacts.bham.ac.uk.

Here’s what some recent participants and alumni had to say…

Dr Joseph Sturman, BHP Starter Fellowship 2023-24

“The fellowship has been essential to my career development and I am in no doubt that without it, I would not have been able to embark on a PhD. The fellowship has opened up so many opportunities for collaboration and research both locally and nationally, and I look back on the BHP Starter Fellowship as a pivotal moment in my career.”

Read more from Joseph here

Dr Anna Seale, BHP CARP scheme 2023-25

“My advice to anyone applying would be think carefully about what you are going to do, be flexible that things may change as you learn more about your project, use the resources of the academic institutions, and recognise that this is only the start of a longer journey. Just do it!”

Read more from Anna here

Dr Mark Openshaw, BHP New Consultant scheme 2024-26

“Having protected time for research – and formal recognition of its value – is essential to progressing my work on circulating tumour DNA. The BHP scheme offered a strong initial opportunity to secure dedicated research time, alongside support from experienced academic clinicians, which made it an ideal platform to help sustain and grow my research career.“

Read more from Mark here

Learn more about our programmes and apply

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BHP Annual Meeting details announced

Written by Louise Stanley on . Posted in Birmingham Health Partners.

Birmingham Health Partners annual meeting will be held on the afternoon of 19th November (1.00pm – 5.00pm), at the Edgbaston Park Hotel, Birmingham.

Our keynote speaker will be Prof Waljit Dhillo, Dean of the NIHR Academy and NIHR Scientific Director for Research Capacity and Capabilities.  We will also hear from our new Chair of Birmingham Health Partners, Richard Meddings, CBE.

A full programme will follow in the next few weeks. 

To register please email k.mcnaughton@bham.ac.uk by 31st October 2025.

Please also indicate your order of preference for which themed table session you would like to join:

Tackling the NHS 10 year plan: how can we use BHP to address the “Three Shifts”

  • Theme 1: Analogue to Digital
  • Theme 2: Hospital to Community
  • Theme 3: Treatment to Prevention

Professor Dhillo is a Professor in Endocrinology & Metabolism at Imperial College London and Consultant Endocrinologist at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust. His research includes the development of safer IVF treatment for women; robotic sensor technology to diagnose women’s reproductive health problems in real-time; and exploring whether kisspeptin can ultimately be used to treat men with common psychosexual disorders, such as low libido. He was previously an NIHR Research Professor and this year was appointed as an NIHR Senior Investigator.

As Dean of the NIHR Academy, Professor Dhillo will support the delivery and development of NIHR Academy schemes, including the Integrated Academic Training Programme, Personal Research Fellowships, the Integrated Clinical Academic Programme, the Infrastructure Training Forum, as well as a number of Global Health Training Programmes. Working in partnership with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) and the NIHR Academy CEO, Professor Dhillo will provide oversight on the development and delivery of NIHR research training programmes, to ensure they meet the needs of the current research landscape, as well as identifying future gaps and how to solve them.

Birmingham researchers join Nobel Prize winner to win major funding on chronic inflammation

Written by Louise Stanley on . Posted in Inflammation and chronic disease.

Researchers at the University of Birmingham will lead a major research programme to transform the treatment of autoimmune diseases by halting chronic inflammation at its source, working in partnership with 025 Nobel Prize winner Professor Shimon Sakaguchi, from Osaka University, and Professor Calliope Dendrou from the University of Oxford.

Backed by a £3.83 million Wellcome Discovery Award, the ambitious eight-year programme brings together world-leading scientists and clinician-scientists to focus on understanding and controlling the immune system’s regulatory mechanisms, with a particular focus on the liver.

Research will focus on the role of Foxp3+ Regulatory T-cells in maintaining immune tolerance and preventing tissue damage caused by autoimmune responses. Scientists and clinicians in the UK and Japan will explore how these Regulatory T-cells discovered by Professor Sakaguchi can be used to restore immune balance and treat autoimmune diseases.

Project leader Ye Htun Oo, Professor of Autoimmune Liver Diseases, from BHP founder-member the University of Birmingham, has been working in research partnership for more than 12 years with Professor Sakaguchi who was announced this week as one of three co-winners of the 2025 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine – alongside US scientists Mary Brunkow and Fred Ramsdell – for their work understanding how Regulatory T-cells maintain a healthy balance within the immune system, creating openings for possible new autoimmune disease and cancer treatments.

Professor Oo commented: “Congratulations to Professor Sakaguchi on his Nobel Prize success – we are looking forward to continuing the University of Birmingham’s longstanding research partnership with him as we explore together how the Regulatory T cells that he discovered 30 years ago can help to treat autoimmune liver diseases.”

He also commented that Birmingham is one of the biggest liver transplant centres in Europe and this new approach of controlling autoimmune diseases with Regulatory T cells, will give hope to prevent liver transplantations for autoimmune liver diseases in future.

Autoimmune diseases occur when the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks its own tissues. In liver diseases such as autoimmune hepatitis, primary biliary cholangitis, and primary sclerosing cholangitis, there is currently no cure, leading to chronic inflammation, organ damage, and loss of function and eventually requiring liver transplantations.

Professor Sakaguchi commented: “This exciting collaborative award will allow us to work together to understand stable functional regulatory T cells biology and to progress towards future therapy with these cells for patients with autoimmune liver diseases and multi-organ autoimmunity.”

The programme unites the expertise of Professors Sakaguchi and Professor Oo with Professor Graham Anderson, from the University of Birmingham – a leading authority on thymic T-cell development and immune tolerance – and Professor Calliope Dendrou, from the University of Oxford, an expert in immune disease single-cell and spatial multiomics.

Professor Anderson commented: “By revealing how immune cells interact with tissue during chronic inflammation, our goal is to find a way of using these Regulatory T-cells as a naturally occurring way of treating autoimmune disease of the liver – nature’s medicine. We aim to use our work as proof of concept in the liver that is transferrable to other forms of the condition which can cause significant damage to the gut, skin, and other organs.”

Professor Sakaguchi was awarded an honorary Doctor of Science degree by the University of Birmingham in 2019 in recognition of his vision and research driving the development of regulatory T cells as therapeutic in autoimmunity and organ transplantations.

Professor Shimon Sakaguchi following the award of his honorary Doctor of Science degree in 2019 – pictured with the University’s then Pro-Chancellor Ed Smith CBE (left) and former Head of College of Medicine and Health Professor David Adams. (Photo: Paul Bonning-Tyers from Ede and Ravenscroft)

New project to explore effective of vaping on respiratory system

Written by Louise Stanley on . Posted in Birmingham Health Partners.

The benefits and harms of vaping for long term respiratory health will be the focus of a new research project, thanks to a funding award of £1.46m by the Medical Research Council (MRC).

Building on internationally recognised work in e-cigarette studies at BHP founder-members the University of Birmingham, the EVALUATE study aims to address unanswered questions about the effect of long-term vaping on the respiratory system by conducting a four-year cohort study.

Dr Aaron Scott, Associate Professor in Respiratory Science at the University of Birmingham and Chief Investigator of EVALUATE said: “We will study how vaping affects important airway immune cells and the epithelial cells which line the insides of the lung. Since these cell types play a critical role in the development of smoking-related lung diseases, these changes will provide clear insight into vaping’s on lung health”

“This study will provide critical data needed to understand the safety of vaping as a short-term smoking cessation strategy and in longer-term usage so people can make an informed personal choice”

David Thickett, Professor of Respiratory Medicine at the University of Birmingham and Clinical lead of University Hospitals Birmingham’s staff smoking cessation service said: “The EVALUATE study will investigate changes to immune and lung cell health following vaping. Supported by the NIHR Birmingham Biomedical Research Centre, the multi-faceted study will also investigate how vaping changes the human microbiome after smoking cessation. For the trillions of microorganisms that live on and in the human body, environmental factors can affect the delicate balance of microbiomes and can impact health if disrupted.”

Dr Dhruv Parekh, Associate Professor in Respiratory Medicine and Director of the University Hospitals Birmingham Clinical Research Facility said: “Studying immune cells from the blood (indirect effects) and from the airways (direct effects) by bronchoscopy, allows us to get a complete picture of how the airways are affected by vaping. This important study will be delivered through our NIHR Clinical Research Facility which is integral to the delivery of this work.”

Dr Mike Cox, Assistant Professor Respiratory Microbiome at the University of Birmingham said: “Smoking can drastically alter microorganisms in our bodies, particularly in the airways. This project will allow us to uncover how vaping impacts this balance and map out how this changes over time.”

Studying toxicants in the airways

Previous work from Dr Scott’s lab at the University of Birmingham has shown that toxicants within e-cigarette vapour, formed by the breakdown of e-liquid, can negatively impact important immune cells, independently to the effects of nicotine. Some of these toxic components of e-cigarette vapour are also found in cigarette smoke. We know this could harm our airways, but this is difficult to sample and measure.

Professor Luis Mur at Aberystwyth University will lead the investigation into the accumulation of toxicants within the airways after vaping. Professor Mur said: “Using our cutting-edge mass spectroscopy platforms, we can monitor how toxicants in the airways change as people move from smoking to vaping. Combined with data on immune cell function, this interdisciplinary approach will give us a powerful insight into the true nature of e-cigarette exposure on the airways.”

This new study will also run alongside a complementary clinical trial, ECAL and linked EME mechanism study, which is examining the impact of vaping in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

The research team will begin recruiting for the EVALUATE study in the Autumn of 2025.