Stories

Breast cancer screening uptake remains disproportionately low among women of south Asian heritage in the UK. Manchester researchers have been using a storytelling tool to help engage these communities.

Air pollution from burning plastic waste is an escalating public health issue, particularly in rural parts of Indonesia. A new study is investigating how this form of pollution contributes to cardiovascular disease risk.

The University of Manchester’s Stephanie Snow created the NHS at 70 project with the aim of collecting NHS stories from patients, staff and families to create a digital archive of the service’s long and illustrious history.

For centuries, people with chronic pain have linked their symptoms to the weather, but scientific proof has been limited. Researchers at Manchester have tackled this question with the world’s first smartphone-based study on weather and pain.

A UK-wide project looking at the impact of exposure to indoor and outdoor pollution during pregnancy on baby development and child health.

A training partnership between experts in Ghana and Manchester is looking to tackle the challenges of rising disease burdens, workforce gaps and increasing demand for quality care in Ghana’s healthcare system.

Our research is investigating how changes in surface water influence zoonotic disease transmission, informing strategies to improve water management and public health in East Africa.

Our researchers are uncovering how air pollution exacerbates chronic diseases in Kenyan people living with HIV, informing interventions to reduce health risks in Kenya and beyond.

Emergency health specialists from The University of Manchester are collaborating with partners in Kisii County, Kenya to ensure emergency healthcare for the region meets national standards.

Researchers at The University of Manchester are developing models and tools that are being used to document and predict how environmental changes are impacting on human health.

Researchers at Manchester are forging partnerships in East Africa to better understand local populations and develop the right interventions to reduce inequalities in cancer care.

Manchester researchers are among the first to apply their world-leading genetic and genomic expertise to study the differences in prostate cancer among ethnic groups to deliver more tailored, targeted treatment.

The GMHAT tool developed by experts in the NHS has become a viable option for UK and international health professionals and organisations needing to make mental health assessments quickly and easily.

University researchers are pioneering a new topical treatment for cervical cancer and forming global partnerships to help more women in developing countries survive the disease.

Professor Mahesh Nirmalan has worked with colleagues at the University to increase understanding of who has been affected by conflict in northern Uganda, including those with limb loss, to better target care.

University of Manchester researchers have drafted the first mental health policy for Pakistan, which is being initially implemented in Sindh Province for its population of approximately 50 million people.

Our work in the emergency department has helped develop ultra-high sensitivity blood tests and rapid decision-making tools for patients suspected of having had a heart attack, allowing for quicker treatment, improved recovery and earlier discharge.

Experts in the Faculty of Biology, Medicine and Health are working with the Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute (HCRI) on global health.

A collaboration with Peking University has helped to boost genomic and genetic knowledge and skills in China, and impacted on global healthcare systems.

Researchers at Manchester are collaborating with Indonesian experts through the STAND-Indonesia project to help identify potential care pathways and treatments for depression and anxiety.

Manchester is one of three universities working together in the fast-moving field of digital health, thanks to an international collaboration with a focus on translational research.

Two Egyptian universities are collaborating with The University of Manchester to enhance their medical training programmes and equip students with the skills they need to work as a doctor internationally.

Find out how electrical stimulation is being used to help people with swallowing difficulties following a stroke or brain injury.

A social communication intervention developed from original Manchester-led UK research has been adapted for low-resource settings and non-specialist delivery in two regions in South Asia to help boost support for families with young autistic children.

Research at The University of Manchester has helped grow the evidence base for biliary tract cancers and set international treatment standards that have improved survival rates.

Manchester experts have been involved with a partnership with the Kenyan government to help uplift healthcare practices in the country based on models developed in Greater Manchester.

Rare conditions are thought to affect 1 in 17 people in the UK. There are approximately 7,000 known rare conditions, such as Huntington's disease and cystic fibrosis. Many are genetic, but understanding and treatment of these diseases varies around the world.

When Professor Vaskar Saha saw the impact of childhood leukaemia in India, he asked: who can take on this challenge? Having already helped families across Europe to beat the disease, he knew that this was his calling.

Clinical pharmacy is a growing field within the Chinese healthcare sector. A teaching collaboration between The University of Manchester and China Pharmaceutical University is enabling Chinese students to develop the skills they need to work in clinical pharmacy.

Rwanda has big ambitions to transform health care in Sub-Saharan Africa. Olivier Ndahiriwe, an Equity and Merit Scholar at Manchester, aims to make these ambitions a reality.

We are using this information to help build capacity to conduct genome wide studies of congenital heart disease in low- and middle-income countries and improve early diagnosis in these settings. The early detection of congenital heart disease allows for greatly improved clinical outcomes and reduces the risk of complications arising later in life.

Pharmacy lecturer David Allison's service learning workshops see Manchester students bring healthcare education into schools and encourage pupils to consider higher education. David tells us why this has been such a success after winning a social responsibility award for his project.

In the UK there is one audiologist for every 25,000 people. In Malawi, audiology services for the entire country were run by just a few foreign volunteers. That was until four Malawian students travelled to Manchester to train as the country’s first qualified audiologists.

Falls can lead to life-changing injuries, premature care home admittance and are the most common cause of injury-related death for this age group. Dr Emma Stanmore is working with local NHS trusts to deliver falls prevention exercises in the form of a computer game to help older people avoid injury and increase their mobility.

Escaping persecution can be one of the most dangerous, traumatising experiences in a person’s life. During their journey to safety, it can be especially challenging for refugees and asylum seekers to access important services such as dental care.

Up to 2% of the UK population will experience psychosis in their lifetime, with symptoms including hallucinations and intrusive voices, but access to mental health support services can be limited. A team at Manchester have developed Actissist, an app to support people in the early stages of psychosis when they need help.

Research into the effects of air pollution on heart health is growing as more people call for action on climate change around the world. One Manchester researcher has used her expertise in animal physiology to show how pollutants can have the same negative impact on human health as they do on marine life.

Novel genomic technologies could solve some of Africa's most pressing healthcare challenges, including global diseases and diseases of poverty that are rare in more developed countries. This has been the focus of a partnership between the Universities of Manchester and Cape Town in disease genomics, particularly in heart disease.

Our work in the emergency department has helped develop ultra-high sensitivity blood tests and rapid decision-making tools for patients suspected of having had a heart attack, allowing for quicker treatment, improved recovery and earlier discharge.

People of African and Caribbean backgrounds are statistically more likely to be diagnosed with schizophrenia and psychosis than other ethnic groups in the UK, but the least likely to access psychological care. Professor Dawn Edge is on a mission to change this.

Collaborations between experts in Kenya and Manchester are working to address key health issues in the African country, particularly in the area of cancer.

We developed a urine test to determine if patients with high blood pressure are taking their medicines, so healthcare professionals can work more effectively with them and reduce complications from high blood pressure later in life.

Using large patient datasets, we are developing tools to enable GPs to identify which patients are at greatest risk of developing heart and circulatory disease as a consequence of their diabetes, and the risk of future heart attacks in patients who have previously had a heart attack.

On average there is one death by suicide every two hours in the UK. It is the leading cause of death among young people aged 20 to 34 and the highest suicide rates occur in men aged between 40 and 44 years old.

What could be the most effective way of spreading awareness of one of the biggest issues facing the world today? Engaging the public and giving them the tools to pass the message on to more people, according to one Manchester academic.

Researchers have developed more accurate computer models of blood flow through vessels and across heart valves. These will help improve surgical approaches to correcting blood vessel and heart valve disorders and enable clinicians to better interpret MRI images.

Permanent hearing loss affects approximately one in a thousand babies in the UK. Audiology researchers from Manchester are taking a unique approach to discover the most effective tests to help these children and their families.

University can feel like a big place for new students but people like Dr Doron Cohen, lecturer and first year lead for BSc Psychology, help to make the big pond feel smaller. His time at Manchester has seen him go from undergraduate to researcher to teacher, and his current work explores mental health in psychology students.

Our researchers have developed better diagnostic tests for pre-eclampsia, a potentially serious condition occurring in pregnancy that can affect both the mother and baby, and are assessing new treatment options to reduce the risk of complications.

For a quarter of a century, Sri Lanka played host to a civil war which claimed the lives of more than 100,000 people. One man who managed to flee in the early days of the conflict is Dr Senathirajah ‘Raj’ Ariyaratnam, who now uses his experiences to train Sri Lanka’s dentists and address dental health inequalities closer to home.

Our researchers and clinicians dedicate their careers to the prevention and treatment of cancer, and the care of patients. Their individual and collective quests for breakthroughs that will benefit society are the inspiration behind this collection of articles.

For those transitioning, having a voice that matches their gender identity is an important part of feeling comfortable and confident. Dr Sean Pert, Senior Lecturer in SLT, runs regular voice and communication workshops with his students at the LGBT Foundation in Manchester.

Our researchers have identified an important role for two proteins in the blood vessels of the brain which appear to be linked to the development of brain injury in Alzheimer’s disease and offer the prospect of new treatments for this condition.

The armed conflict in Syria broke out in 2011, causing the largest humanitarian crisis since the second world war. The lives of more than 8 million children have been put in danger, their worlds turned upside down by witnessing destruction, violence and death.

Allergies are as much a part of British summertime as Wimbledon and wet weekends by the seaside, but they are also on the rise with hay fever affecting an estimated one in five people in the UK. Now a team from The University of Manchester is trying to understand what is contributing to the seasonal misery of millions.

Clustered Regularly Interspaced Palindromic Repeats isn’t something that rolls off the tongue, yet it is set to be the biggest scientific breakthrough of the 21st century. Better known as CRISPR, this technique allows scientists to modify and change the genetic makeup of cells, possessing far-reaching potential to treat genetic disease and enhance human health.

Manchester researchers have also developed a toolkit that enables healthcare professionals to appropriately evaluate new and unmet needs of patients who have had a stroke and enable appropriate care to be implemented and support post-stroke recovery.

Every two minutes, someone in the UK is diagnosed with cancer. With one in every two people likely to get a cancer diagnosis at some point in our lives, it is a disease that affects us all.

Intracerebral haemorrhage is a life-threatening type of stroke affecting over 10,000 people in the UK each year. We developed a care bundle based on our research which reduced patient deaths by a third. It is now in use at 28 hospitals across the north of England.

A new genetic test to identify gene mutations that could reduce the effectiveness of a drug commonly prescribed after ischaemic stroke.

We used remotely monitored health data to identify deterioration in heart failure patients and issue real-time alerts to hospital staff, allowing for timely specialist intervention and a reduction in the risk of hospitalisation and death.

Our research has become part of a public health programme in Indonesia, where cardiovascular disease accounts for 1 in 3 deaths. We developed an intervention which achieved a reduction in the number of people at high risk and an estimated 3,750 people had an extended life expectancy as a result of the trial.

Our research into the genetic causes of blindness has revolutionised clinical practice – leading to faster, more precise diagnoses and tailored genetic counselling for thousands of patients worldwide.

Our researchers are aiming to learn more about the effects of polyaromatic hydrocarbon pollutants on our health.

We developed a series of world-leading biologic treatment registers to monitor the safety of drugs used to treat conditions such as rheumatoid arthritis. The research has been used to influence national treatment guidelines and increase access to effective treatments.

Our research into personalised forms of immunotherapy has undergone rapid commercialisation to deliver life-saving results for patients worldwide.

Research conducted at The University of Manchester into risk factors associated with stillbirths has influenced UK and international health policy, helping to educate parents and save lives.

The UK’s first NHS high-energy proton beam therapy centre opened at The Christie Hospital in 2018. Our research was vital in helping to bring this technology to the UK, enabling more patients to access proton therapy for some of the most difficult-to-treat cancers.

More than 300 million people worldwide suffer from serious fungal infections and around two million die each year. Our research is improving patient survival and quality of life, from diagnosis though to drug development.

Manchester researchers are looking at the health and safety implications of gig working in the UK and China.

An interdisciplinary team at Manchester has been working to make a difference to people across Northern Uganda facing the life-changing problem of major limb loss (MLL).

A dynamic collaboration between Dr Dan Wiseman, a consultant haematologist, and Dr Kiran Batta, a basic biologist, is changing the narrative around chronic myelomonocytic leukaemia (CMML).

A collaboration with the CRUK National Biomarker Centre could help patients diagnosed with cancer of unknown primary (CUP).

Manchester has formed a collaboration with the Kenyatta University Teaching, Referral and Research Hospital (KUTRRH) focused on improving oesophageal cancer survival.

Professor Emma Crosbie discusses research into the link between Lynch syndrome and womb cancer, and how this has changed NICE guidance on testing for the syndrome.

Nanomaterials like graphene have the potential to offer advanced tools for the early diagnosis, progression and treatment of cancer. Kostas Kostarelos, Professor of Nanomedicine, tells us about his work in this area.

Team science, which sees experts in different fields work together on a single research question, is yielding exciting results. Professor Rob Bristow explains why he sees this approach as transformative to the cancer research environment.

Ground-breaking research in cervical screening by Professor Emma Crosbie outlines the case for a Prevention and Early Detection (PED) approach.

Professor Kaye Williams' research involves exploiting nanotechnologies in different ways across her research programmes in the Division of Pharmacy and Optometry. Here, Kaye gives us an overview of how they are being used.

A collaboration involving cancer and advanced materials is taking shape to make huge advances in the earlier detection of cancer. Lead supervisor Professor Sarah Cartmell discusses the implications of the new programme.

Professor Stephen Taylor, Head of the Division of Cancer Sciences, explains how a combination of high-quality basic research, translational science, drug discovery and the 'Manchester way' of doing things are yielding results.

Professor Gareth Evans' research is focussed on neurofibromatosis and breast cancer. His research has led him to conclude that risk stratification offers the best way of targeting prevention and early detection (PED) approaches.

Working together to scale up cancer research activity and develop best practice is what Dr Fiona Thistlethwaite considers is the answer to increasing Manchester’s ability to deliver cell therapy clinical trials.

Dr Santiago Zelenay is using his background in fundamental immunology to understand how the immune system can be used to design better therapies for cancer patients.

Professor Tracy Hussell discusses the important link between immunology and cancer, and why Manchester is the perfect place to lead on research that could lead to better patient outcomes.

Focusing on ovarian cancer and drug development, Professor Gordon Jayson tells us why Manchester’s ability to run multiple novel clinical trials is the key to us becoming recognised as international cancer research leaders.

Professor Karen Kirkby, Director of the UK’s first proton beam and research centre, outlines how Manchester is pioneering ground-breaking research into the next generation of cancer challenges.

A change to lung cancer screening policy has been announced following the results of an unusual scheme pioneered in Manchester. Dr Philip Crosbie outlines why Manchester was the perfect place to trial the study.

Professor Andrew Renehan talks about his home-focused cancer research programme, which is resulting in global benefits.

Professor Vaskar Saha’s research is helping to significantly reduce mortality rates in children being treated for cancer in India. Here he talks about his mission to transfer global standards of care to a low resource country.

Professor Caroline Dive CBE and her team are working with The Christie, developing ‘liquid biopsies’ to hunt cancer cells that have broken free from tumours and are circulating in the bloodstream. Here she tells us why her three year stay in Manchester has turned into 19 and counting!

Professor Catharine West tells us how her decision to come to Manchester enabled her to pioneer developments in personalised radiotherapy.

Clinical oncologist Professor Ananya Choudhury is leading one of the world’s most innovative radiotherapy treatment machines here in Manchester, one of the first seven of its kind globally. Here she tells us how the MR-linac will transform patient outcomes.

Countries, including the UK, have been raising awareness about men’s health and diseases such as prostate and testicular cancer as part of the Movember campaign. Professor Catharine West tells us about the discovery of a new targeted and improved form of prostate cancer treatment.

Andy Brass, Professor of Bioinformatics outlines the diversity of the data and expertise that is now needed in cancer research, from computer science through to medicine and genomics.

A Canadian native and long-time supporter of the Movember Foundation, Professor Rob Bristow tells us about his ambitions around prostate cancer research.

Professor Tim Illidge believes that it is the combination of clinical and scientific research teams, and their multidisciplinary working, which is driving innovations in personalised cancer medicine.