Speakers profile
The aHUS patient family conference will feature several speakers who will bring their own particular expertise and insights on the subject. You can find their quick profile below.
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Judith Goodship
Judith Goodship is Professor of Medical Genetics at Newcastle University.
With Tim Goodship she led the research that implicated complement factor H in haemolytic syndrome (HUS) which in turn led on to research of other components of the complement system In HUS. In addition to her university role she is an NHS consultant in the Northern Genetic Service which is based at the Newcastle Upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust but sees families with genetic disorders throughout the north of England.
Prof. Tim Goodship
Tim Goodship is Professor of Renal Medicine at Newcastle University and a Consultant Nephrologist in the Newcastle upon Tyne Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.
He has been interested in atypical HUS for nearly twenty years. With his wife, Professor Judith Goodship, he was the first to identify genetic abnormalities in complement in aHUS in the 1990s. Subsequently their team has gone on to discover a range of inherited and acquired abnormalities in complement in individuals with aHUS. He is the UK lead researcher for the eculizumab studies and is currently preparing a bid for central national funding for the investigation and treatment of aHUS.
Jamie Holyer
Jamie Holyer is Managing Director of Advocate, a communications consultancy that helps clients to understand government healthcare policy and campaign in Westminster and Whitehall.
He was formerly a political journalist and media relations adviser to the Labour Party.
Sally Johnson
Dr Sally Johnson is a Consultant Paediatric Nephrologist at the Great North Children's Hospital in Newcastle. She trained in clinical and laboratory research into aHUS under Dr Mark Taylor, Birmingham Children's Hospital. During her PhD she studied how mutant factor H proteins interact with kidney cells in the development of aHUS. She is a member of the European Paediatric Study Group for atypical HUS and is co-author of their 2009 Guideline "Investigation and initial management of diarrhoea-negative HUS in children" and is currently leading an international audit of the outcome of the guideline. She has authored a number of chapters and review on aHUS. She is keen to translate any advances in the treatment of aHUS into benefit for all affected children in the UK.
Dr Taylor Mark
Dr C Mark Taylor, Consultant Emeritus, Birmingham Children’s Hospital. Currently the chairman of the Renal Association’s Rare Disease Committee, and joint author of the “Integrated Strategy for Rare Kidney Disease” . Past president of the British Association for Paediatric Nephrology. I have held an interest in the various forms of HUS since the 1980s and have therefore seen extraordinary changes in the way the syndrome is understood and how childhood patients can be supported. The first of those changes was better characterisation of the condition and better targeting of supportive care. Now there are real prospects for direct treatments. I will discuss how the rare disease strategy applies to HUS and how there can be a real partnership between patients, doctors and scientist in the very near future.
Dr Pat McKiernan
I am 51 years old and married with five children. I qualified in 1983 and trained in medicine and paediatrics in Belfast. I came to Birmingham to train in hepatology in 1991 and liked it so much that I have stayed here since.
I have a special clinical interest in inherited metabolic liver disease and portal hypertension.
My research interests are in the clinical aspects of inherited metabolic liver disease, portal hypertension, novel endoscopic techniques, non-invasive markers of hepatic fibrosis and immunosuppression following liver transplantation.
Outside work my family keeps me busy and I try to keep fit and sane by cycling.
Prof. Matthew Pickering
I am a Professor of Rheumatology at the Centre for Complement and Inflammation Research, Imperial College, London. My research program studies the role of complement regulation in health and disease and is funded by a Wellcome Trust Senior Fellowship in Clinical Science. My clinical interests include systemic lupus erythematosus and complement deficiency. I am a member of The Henry Kunkel Society, the Association of Physicians of Great Britain and Ireland and Secretary of the European Complement Network.
Prof. Neil Sheerin
Neil Sheerin is the Professor of Nephrology at Newcastle University and a Consultant Nephrologist at the Freeman Hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne. He moved to Newcastle in 2007 from Guy’s Hospital, London where he was a Senior Lecturer in Renal Medicine and before that a Wellcome Trust Fellow. His laboratory research has focused on understanding how abnormal activation of the immune system leads to renal disease. In particular his research investigates the role of the complement system in different types of kidney disease. He is also interested in ways in which complement-based treatments can be used to prevent kidney damage. His clinical interests include the treatment of diseases that cause kidney inflammation and transplantation medicine.