A few days ago Professor Karen Morrison rang me. Karen is the director of the Birmingham care centre. She is also one of the principal investigators on our DNA bank project. After giving me an update how she was helping to resolve an issue with the DNA bank, Karen mentioned in passing that she had been at the Association of British Neurologist’s (ABN) meeting the week before.
The aim of the ABN is to improve the health and well-being of people with neurological disorders by advancing the knowledge and practice of neurology in the British Isles. I heard that their annual meeting was taking place last week, so I asked her how it went. I was glad I did! It seems that there was a star* of MND neurologists giving presentations at the four day meeting which took place in Bournemouth.
There was a both a workshop and a teaching session on motor neurone disease. These covered talks on diagnosing MND, managing the symptoms of MND, causes of MND and the cellular mechanisms involved. The workshop was so crowded that they ran out of seats! So awareness of MND of those attending will have definitely been raised!
Professor Michael Swash, a neurologist specialising in MND who has previously chaired our Research Advisory Panel as well as being a former Chair of the Board of Trustees of the MND Association, was awarded the ABN medal this year. The medal is awarded annually to recognise outstanding contributions by British neurologists to the science or practice of neurology, or for contributions to the Association. This news was the icing on the cake!
I hope that this awareness raising will go some way to encourage neurologists to act on their new knowledge, both in terms of caring for people with MND and in keeping up to date with MND research.
*I don’t know that there is a collective noun for neurologists that specialise in MND, but ‘a star of neurologists’ seems quite appropriate – what do you think? Please leave a comment and let us know!
