Funder: Chief Scientists Office. Value: £34,997 One fifth of the 70,000 UK patients that break their hip annually suffer a loss of kidney function, known as acute kidney injury (AKI). AKI can lead to a longer hospital stay, dialysis, and even death. Routine tests for AKI detect the disease at a very late stage when treatment is ineffective. We are planning a large-scale clinical evaluation of a new test that identifies AKI early with the aim of reducing the severity and harm of AKI after hip fracture. This grant will fund some of the preliminary work that will be required to apply for a larger grant to this work. This preliminary work will consist of the following: - A systematic Review: We will carefully search the biomedical literature to identify any studies that have previously studied new tests in the diagnosis of AKI to determine whether our proposed work is original, and to make sure we are not repeating work that has already been done. - A service Evaluation: To help calculate the potential benefit to patients of our new test we will examine patients who are admitted to the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh after a hip fracture and try and work out how many of these patients develop AKI, and how this affects their outcomes. - A public and patient involvement event. It is essential that our research is designed in such a way as to maximise the relevance and benefit to patients whilst minimising the burden on those that take part in the study. We therefore seek to involve patients in our study design at the grant application stage. We will hold a patient and public involvement (PPI) event where we will collaborate with patient and members of the public in the design of our study, and to identify one or two individuals that may wish to be co-applicants on our grant. For more information please contact: Dr David M Griffith This article was published on 2024-09-24
