Lisa has been busy so far scanning lots of dogs to investigate conformation of hind and forelimbs. All the dogs have been under anaesthetic for another procedure, and we can simply support their limb in position for a quick scan with the 3D scanner. Lisa then puts in all the hard work to generate a model.
A huge thank you to everyone that came to the CPD event this week!
We really enjoyed talking osteoarthritis and shockwave therapy with lots of local vets, and it was great to share ideas about further treatment for all our arthritic dogs out there. Thanks to Nupsala for their support, and to all our speakers for some very informative talks. Matthew Allen was joined by Karen Cook from Nupsala, and Richard Whitelock from the Queen's Veterinary School Hospital.
We are very pleased to welcome Lisa Grassato to the SDC for a 3 month research project with Professor Matthew Allen.
She joins us from the University of Bologna in Italy where she is undertaking her PhD in Veterinary Medicine, and her project here will involve using our 3D surface scanner to get measurements for dogs legs, with the aim of developing new supportive braces.
Last year we had our first ever bird for gait analysis!
It was a very excited team that had the opportunity to work with Big Al in the gait lab after he had surgery to fix a fractured leg.
For more details of his journey through the Queen's Veterinary School Hospital see CamVet: https://camvet.vet.cam.ac.uk/PDF/CF
Thanks to Claudia for a great talk today to colleagues at the Department of Veterinary Medicine. The group enjoyed a very interesting presentation about potential benefits of surgical navigation and 3d printing to improve planning and performing canine hip replacement surgery. Including some example pelvises printed on our resin and ABS plastic 3d printers which helped illustrate the vast morphological differences between dogs, and the challenges facing surgeons.
Professor Kenneth Johnson is a visiting professor in the Surgical Discovery Centre at Cambridge from June 2017 till January 2018. During this time, he will be working on research on stress fractures, as well as use of computer navigation in orthopaedic surgery. Ken is a graduate of the University of Sydney where he also obtained a Masters and PhD degrees. He completed residency training in surgery at Colorado State University, and since then has worked in academia as an orthopaedic specialist in the USA, UK and Australia. He has specialist qualifications in surgery as a Diplomate of American College of Veterinary Surgeons, a Diplomate of European College of Veterinary Surgery, as well as being a Fellow of Australian College of Veterinary Scientists.
In addition, Prof Johnson organizes the AO courses on fracture treatment in Columbus Ohio and Sydney and is a past president of AO VET (an international foundation dedicated to fracture treatment in animals) Research on osteoarthritis, locked nailing of fractures, greyhound stress fractures and locking implants are among his interests. He is the author of over 110 clinical and research publications on orthopaedics, 30 book chapters, as well as several books including the new fifth edition of Piermattei's Surgical Approaches to Bones and Joints. In addition he is Editor-in-Chief of the journal Veterinary and Comparative Orthopaedics and Traumatology. Recently he was given the WSAVA/Hills Pet mobility award for his contributions to clinical research in orthopaedics in dogs and cats.
This month the 3D printer and Jose Franco have been working doubletime printing bones from CT scans!
Professors Matthew Allen and Ken Johnson have been working together on the next stage of this exciting project.
The printed bones are worked to reconstruct the canine knee joint, to continue the work started by Engineering student Rachel Lewis testing surgical navigation in orthopaedic surgery.
This month Ruby Baxter took part in a celebration event for the Nuffield Research Placement Scheme.
Ruby presented her work comparing different canine osteosarcoma cell lines from different tumours, that she completed at the SDC under the supervision and guidance of Charlotte Palmer.
It was a wonderful evening, celebrating the students' hard work and achievements, and great to see such enthusiasm for science!
We just got back from ACVS in Indianapolis last week; a great event with a packed schedule and plenty of interesting topics discussed.
Matthew Allen presented on Total Knee Replacement, Surgical Site Infections, and Prevention of Implant Associated Infections.
We talked shockwave with our collaborator Kirsten Haeusler from Tierphysiotherapie, visited the Gait Lab at Purdue University, and are full of excitement about future projects! Thanks to everyone at Purdue for our visit, and hope to be back next year.
We would like to welcome Luke Johnson to the SDC, who is a fourth year student at the Engineering Department of the University of Cambridge. Luke has been here before, on an Undergraduate Research Opportunities Programme placement in the summer of 2016, and after specialising in Bioengineering in his third year he has returned to the Surgical Discovery Centre for his final year project, under the joint supervision of Professor Matthew Allen and Dr Michael Sutcliffe of the Engineering Department.
With a working title “Robotic Testing of Canine Knee Replacement" the project involves manipulation of cadaveric canine knees using our industrial 6-degree-of-freedom robot arm to investigate the effect of total knee replacement on the kinetics and kinematics of the knee.
The surgical navigation working prototype is now in the final stages of testing! Rachel Lewis put in a great deal of work on this project, and we are really sorry to see her go, but the rest of her degree awaits!
We have been delighted to welcome Ruby Baxter from Neale-Wade Academy, who won a 4 week research placement here, organised with the Nuffield Foundation This has provided an insight into working as a professional scientist, and opportunities to learn new skills.
With supervision from Charlotte Palmer, Ruby has been working hard investigating the characteristics of 4 different canine osteosarcoma cell lines from different tumours. She is comparing their ability to grow and migrate in order to understand how the cell lines behave differently, and how these differences may affect the prognosis for canine patients.
Thank you for all your hard work Ruby and good luck for the future!
In July we travelled to Stuttgart, Germany, and were really lucky to see how Focussed Shockwave Therapy is being used as part of the extensive facilities at TierPhysiotherapie in small animal rehabilitation and treatment.
The visit, with the support of Storz Medical, is just the start of ongoing collaborations and we are very excited to incorporate such therapies into our research setting.
It was a great opportunity to see the variety of cases having shockwave therapy, and to see first hand how this is being used alongside complementary therapies such as with the underwater treadmill. A huge thank you to everyone involved,especially Dr Kirsten Hausler and the team, and to the clients and patients at the clinic for allowing us to follow their treatment.
We are now really looking forward to getting our recently installed Shockwave unit up and running!
The Surgical Discovery Centre enjoys an ongoing collaboration with the Department of Engineering at the University of Cambridge, with many opportunities to share resources and combine expertise in ongoing research.
Two of the Engineers on recent projects, Angus Bain and Tom Broughton have now finished their placements with us. A huge thank you for all their hard work, we wish them all the best for their futures!
As well as assisting the students here in Cambridge, a team from the SDC recently travelled to the University of Liverpool to take part in the Total Knee Replacement course run by Biomedtrix. Professor Matthew Allen and colleagues demonstrated the surgical techniques to a group of Veterinary surgeons from the UK and Europe. It was a great opportunity, bringing together experts from the two Universities, and America, to share their vast knowledge and experience of the procedure with attendees.
This week saw a wide range of researchers from all over the Department of Veterinary Medicine come together to share their recent work and present ideas for the future. It was a great opportunity to showcase the diversity of research that is going on, and to meet fellow researchers both within and across different specialities.
Charlotte Palmer presented her work on circulating tumour cells in osteosarcoma patients, and Amy Stelman presented a pilot study into the diagnosis of ectopic ureters in Golden retrievers using ultrasonography.
This was a fantastic afternoon and we are already looking forward to next year!
It was a pleasure to welcome a group of final year Cambridge Veterinary Students to the Surgical Discovery Centre as part of their Elective Study weeks. We looked at how gait analysis can be used with both clinical and research cases, including diagnosis and ongoing investigations into medical or surgical intervention. They then had the opportunity to apply their knowledge with Harry and Wiggy who are always very obliging patients!
Well done everyone for all your hard work and good luck for the future.
Professor Matthew Allen chaired a departmental seminar this week, with the invited speaker Dr Constanza Gomez Alvarez from the University of Surrey talking about her exciting work into gait analysis in dogs. We have ongoing collaborations between our facilities, and Dr Gomez Alvarez has been instrumental in this. It was a very informative talk, and opened up lively discussions about the future of gait analysis and it's continued integration into patient care.
The Surgical Discovery Centre was very pleased to host a group of scientists from the Cambridge Resource Centre for Comparative Genomics this week.
Our meeting room provided the perfect facilities for presenting their ongoing research projects.
Pictured here are some of the team with Principal Investigator Professor Malcolm Ferguson-Smith.
Veterinary Nurses here in the Surgical Discovery Centre, and within the Department of Veterinary Medicine at the University of Cambridge, play a huge role in research, so we are joining in VN Awareness Month in May to celebrate this! #whatvnsdo
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