New life-saving heart partnership

Heart surgery patients will benefit from a new collaborative partnership between our University and the James Lind Alliance, which will be identifying the top priorities in heart surgery research in the UK.

The Heart Surgery Priority Setting Partnership is headed by Professor Gavin Murphy and seeks to develop a national research strategy in cardiovascular surgery.

Professor Murphy said: “We want to identify the key research questions in cardiac surgery. By asking doctors, patients, and their carers for their views we can be confident that our research will address the needs of everyone. This means that our research is more likely to succeed and more likely to improve the lives of our patients.”

The Heart Surgery PSP’s first step is to conduct a national survey to identify the research priorities of patients, carers, clinicians and researchers-whether that be prevention of heart disease, diagnosis, or treatment and care of people undergoing heart surgery.

This will be followed up by a second survey to prioritise the questions asked and help decide where research funds should be allocated.

The overall aim of the Heart Surgery PSP is to ensure that research is relevant to people dealing with the issues surrounding heart surgery every day.