Preventing hospital infection with innovation | Chris O’Brien Lifehouse

A team of scientists has been
recognised by their peers for the top idea at the 2019 NHMRC Research
Excellence Awards for research into protecting medical devices from infection.

Scientists from Chris O’Brien Lifehouse, UNSW Science, the University of
Sydney and Macquarie University were honoured last night at the National Health
and Medical Research Council’s (NHMRC) annual Research Excellence Awards in
Canberra. The team, led by Professor Mark Wilcox, from UNSW Sydney, received
the ‘Marshall and Warren Ideas Grant Award’ for the top ranked NHMRC Ideas
Grant.

The prestigious awards recognise recent outstanding performance in the
health and medical research field.  The
Ideas Grant scheme supports innovative research projects and each year, the
best idea is selected for recognition via a highly competitive peer review
process.

Head of Physics Research and Education at Chris O’Brien Lifehouse, Associate Professor Natalka Suchowerska said, “Our idea is about preventing potentially deadly hospital-acquired infections that occur when microbes colonise medical devices like catheters and feeding tubes. Cancer patients are particularly vulnerable, and any type of infection prolongs healing and recovery. This research has the potential to solve a pressing global health problem.”

The team received the NHMRC Excellence Award for their grant, ‘Tackling
Hospital Acquired Infections with Peptide Mimics,’ which investigates ways to
protect medical devices from infection.

“This is a truly collaborative effort,” A/Prof Suchowerska said.
“Scientists from diverse disciplines and institutions have put their minds
together to come up with the critical pieces of the puzzle – culminating in a
way of treating the surfaces of medical devices to make them resistant to
microbial colonisation.”

Prof Willcox and A/Prof Suchowerska collaborated with Professors Naresh Kumar and Cyrille Boyer from UNSW, Professor Jonathan Clark AM from Chris O’Brien Lifehouse, Professor David McKenzie from the University of Sydney and Professor Karen Vickery from Macquarie University on the successful grant. The expertise in the team ranges across materials physics, plasma physics and medical physics, microbiology, biochemistry and surgery.

“Medical devices, such as pacemakers, catheters and artificial joints
can become infected and cause issues for hospitals and patients, in the worst
cases death. I look forward to investigating ways to protect medical devices
and stop them from becoming infected,” Prof Willcox said.

The Marshall and Warren Award recognises the most highly innovative and
potentially transformative grant from all the NMHRC Project Grant scheme
applications each year. The award is named after Australian Nobel Laureates
Professors Barry Marshall and Robin Warren, who were awarded the 2005 Nobel
Prize in Physiology or Medicine.