XXXVII^th Edinburgh
Anaesthesia Festival
20-22 August 2025

He is developing the anaesthetic side of Project Kuyenda and will return to Malawi in November. Longer term he is pursuing a funding model for trainees to be able to spend 3-6 months there developing the service.

If you have any surplus needles or kit which you can donate to Project Kuyenda, it would be very much appreciated. Please email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Working in the national subspecialist cardiothoracic critical care unit and as part of the Scottish National Advanced Heart Failure Service, he has developed an interest in the management of cardiogenic shock and the utilisation of advanced mechanical circulatory support. His other clinical interests include point-of-care ultrasound and clinical education.

His focus is on clinical trial programs in ICU patients, and he is a key member of the Collaboration for Research in Intensive Care. He led the land-mark trials - 6S, TRISS, CLASSIC and COVID STEROID trials - the results of which has improved fluid, transfusion, and steroid therapy for critically ill patients. His ongoing research continues along this track testing frequent interventions for which there are doubts about the balance between benefit and harm, including IV fluids, anti-arrhythmics, antibiotics, blood products and glucose control in ICU patients. An increasing focus is on improved trial infrastructure to facilitate many more trials and improvements in health care. Hence, he leads the Intensive Care Platform Trial – INCEPT, which is a platform trial for acutely-admitted, adult ICU patients.

Her interests are in obstetric anaesthesia, recovery after critical illness, medical education and maternal critical care.

She leads ICU-Heart, a multi-disciplinary collaboration that aims to revolutionise the care of Intensive Care patients by harnessing novel approaches in the use of technology and high dimensional data. Our two exemplar projects - diagnosis of myocardial infarction, and multimorbidity - combine key unanswered research priorities with the need for data driven innovation.

He completed an academic fellowship during his training, leading to numerous peer-reviewed publications and ongoing involvement in research and quality improvement initiatives.

Dr Lafferty is an experienced Educational Supervisor, actively engaged in supporting anaesthetic trainees through all stages of their career progression. He is the founder of the Scottish Final Viva Course, a nationally recognised programme designed to prepare candidates for the FRCA examination.

He is particularly interested in consultant interview preparation and has spent several years mentoring senior trainees entering their first consultant posts. Dr Lafferty is committed to advancing clinical standards through education, leadership, and multidisciplinary collaboration.

She writes and lectures nationally and internationally on aspects of pain management, evidence, and opioid therapy in particular and the implications for public health. Cathy contributes to the work of many public bodies. She was a member of the International Association for the Study of Pain International Taskforce on Opioids and for the World Health Organisation Guideline on Cancer Pain Management. She was Clinical lead for the NICE Guideline on Chronic Pain and topic advisor for the NICE Guideline on Safe Prescribing and Withdrawal Management of Medicines Associated with Dependence. She has provided in-reach pain services to five prisons in the South West of England and frequently contributes to conversations about pain, opioids and painkiller addiction in both written and broadcast media.

He runs trials investigating the cardiovascular and metabolic consequences of obstructive sleep apnoea and investigating new therapeutic options for patients with obstructive sleep apnoea in collaboration with colleagues in the UK Sleep Network. His work spans lab-based biomarker discovery, translational physiological studies and practice changing clinical studies.

X @drchristurnbull

Linkedin www.linkedin.com/in/chris-turnbull-06669323a

She recently completed a PhD in immunology, in particular looking at the immunometabolism of monocytes in inflammatory bowel disease. She has a keen interest in inflammatory diseases and HPB anaesthesia, and wishes to pursue a clinical academic career in these areas. She studied medicine at the University of Glasgow, and moved across the Harthill divide for specialty training in South-East Scotland in 2016. Outside of clinical and academic work, she enjoys running, attempting to remain standing on a paddleboard, and is a Francophile.

X: @Dr_ClaireEllen

LinkedIn: claire-adams-38003a2a1

His research focuses on physical recovery after critical illness, particularly the role of systemic inflammation as a barrier to functional recovery. During his MD (Edinburgh, 2014), David led a mechanistic sub-study of the RECOVER trial, securing personal funding from the Chief Scientists Office in Scotland (CSO) to do this work. This research showed the relationship between systemic inflammation and CMV reactivation on post-ICU mobility. The work also identified important patient subgroups—based on inflammatory profiles, comorbidities, and socioeconomic factors—that see a different response to post-ICU interventions. David co-leads INTACT-2, an NIHR EME funded multicentre trial assessing intravenous iron and darbepoetin in post-ICU recovery which will begin recruitment in the UK next month.

X: @Griffith_DM

Bluesky: @griffdm.bsky.social

Director of Scientific Program for ASGBI. Vice President of the World Society of Emergency Surgery. Congress Secretary, British Hernia Society. Honorary Clinical Senior Lecturer, University of Edinburgh. Course Director, Laparoscopic Skills in Emergency Surgery course, RCSEd

Ewen Harrison is Professor of Surgery and Data Science at the University of Edinburgh and a Consultant HPB Surgeon at the Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh.

He is Director of the Centre for Medical Informatics in the Usher Institute, University of Edinburgh. He leads the Surgical and Critical Care Informatics group,performing data-driven research focused on improving patientoutcomes after surgery. His interests include AI/machine learning, mobile data collection platforms and wearables, decision modelling, and global collaborative research.

He leads the NIHR Unit on Global Surgery at the University of Edinburgh, a collaboration with the University of Birmingham. This provides a platform for the GlobalSurg/COVIDSurg Collaborative, recognised by Guiness World Records as largest scientific consortium worldwide (15,000 individuals across 116 countries).

His work in COVID-19 was recognised with an OBE in the King’s New Year’s Honours, and he has been appointed a Fellow of both the Academic of Medical Sciences and the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

Frances is a Consultant in Cardiothoracic Anaesthesia and Critical Care at The Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh. She graduated from The University of Glasgow in 2013 and has gradually migrated back to the East Coast through her training. She has a subspeciality interest in anaesthesia for the pregnant patient with cardiac disease.

She has been awarded for her compassionate care and previously nominated for the ‘Doctor of the Year’ award in Oxford University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust.

She was instrumental in establishing their departmental wellbeing and sustenance initiative during the pandemic. She is the lead for clinical governance in her group. She is an Honorary Senior Clinical Lecturer with the University of Oxford.

She has been an international key note speaker on wellbeing for clinicians as well as airway management of patients with spinal trauma.

She practices as a career coach working with clinicians to prevent burnout and find clarity to navigate their career transitions.

Hanlie regularly practices yoga, reads as much as possible, loves the outdoors, the ocean and coffee.

Iain is Chief Investigator for the 3rd Sprint National Audit Project (SNAP3) investigating the associations between frailty, multimorbidity and outcomes after surgery in older people.

He worked for many years to improve care for people with hip fracture through research, audit and quality improvement. His research includes the Nottingham Hip Fracture Score and clinical trials of goal-directed fluid therapy, femoral nerve blocks, intravenous iron, intravenous lidocaine and dexamethasone. He has co-authored guidelines for perioperative management of people with hip fracture for the Fragility Fracture Network and the Association of Anaesthetists.

He has a long-standing interest in safety around the time of surgery and is chair of the Centre for Perioperative Care (CPOC) working group revising the National Safety Standards for Invasive Procedures.

She has an interest in improving staff enjoyment at work, delivering increased productivity and efficiency in theatres and challenging poor behaviour in the workplace. Imogen trained at St George’s Hospital, London and moved up to Scotland in 2003 to complete her senior Anaesthetic training. She has been a Consultant at the Borders General Hospital since 2008 and was Clinical Director for Anaesthetics from 2020 until taking up her AMD role. During her CD tenure she undertook NHS Leading for the Future which has been central in providing tools for improvement work and transformative change within the organisation. Ongoing work is focusing on continued productivity gains to address the surgical backlog, setting behavioural standards and empowering staff to address incivility, and tailoring the clinical strategy for the population of the Borders.

I completed most of my anaesthetic training in Edinburgh and my PHEM training in the East of England and London. I have an interest in pre-hospital emergency medicine, paediatric anaesthesia and education. I teach on ALS, APLS and I am an examiner on the DipRTM.

He graduated from the University of Edinburgh with a BSc(Hons) in Physiology in 1999 and MBChB in 2002. He completed basic training in medicine in Glasgow, and in anesthesia in Edinburgh. During this time he led a series of high altitude research projects in Bolivia, and founded a high-altitude research charity, Apex. He was appointed as a clinical lecturer on the ECAT (Edinburgh Clinical Academic Track) at the University of Edinburgh in 2008, and completed a Wellcome Trust-funded PhD in statistical genetics in 2012. He was awarded a Wellcome-Beit Prize Intermediate Clinical Fellowship in 2013. He led a global consensus on harmonisation of research studies in outbreaks for the International Severe Acute Respiratory Infection Consortium (ISARIC), and worked with WHO on H1N1 influenza, MERS, and Ebola. After completing clinical training in 2014 he worked as a visiting scientist at the Broad Institute of Harvard and MIT, before returning to the Roslin Institute, University of Edinburgh to establish a research program in translational applications of genomics in critical care medicine. He works as a consultant in the intensive care unit at the Royal Infirmary, Edinburgh. During the Covid outbreak in 2020-21, he led the UK-wide GenOMICC and ISARIC4C studies, and contributed to the design and delivery of the RECOVERY trial. He discovered new biological mechanisms underlying critical illness in Covid, and contributed to the discovery of effective drug treatments to reduce mortality.

He leads a research programme in translational genomics - using genetic signals from critically ill patients to identify both the targets for drug therapy, and the groups of patients likely to benefit most from any treatment, and testing those therapeutic ideas in highly-efficient model systems.

https://baillielab.net/conferences

He has an interest in high-risk surgery and regular commitment to high-risk anaesthesia and Peri-operative care of Older People undergoing Surgery (POPS) clinics. He gained degrees in Pharmacology and Medicine in London before being appointed to the academic foundation program at the University of Glasgow and then training in anaesthesia and critical care in the south east of Scotland. Upon completion of training and with plans slightly affected by the pandemic, he was appointed as a fellow in critical care transport and ECMO intensive care at Glenfield Hospital, University of Leicester before eventually making it to Toronto where an interest in neuro-monitoring was accelerated during a post-CCT fellowship in Trauma, Neuro-anesthesia & Critical Care at St Michael’s Hospital, The University of Toronto.

She trained in Glasgow and London prior to taking up a consultant post in 2020. She has a passion for cardiogenic shock and ECMO and has undertaken fellowships both nationally and internationally. Louise has recently published on Scottish cardiogenic shock outcomes (EPOCHS) and on geospatial modelling of a Scottish ECPR programme for out of hospital cardiac arrest. She is the lead for ECMO at the Royal Infirmary Edinburgh and Chair of the registered charity, Scottish Extracorporeal Resuscitation Network. When not thinking about ECMO she can be found trail running or skiing in the mountains.

His research centres on medical informatics, machine learning and AI applications at the engineering-medicine interface.

He studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh after completing a PhD in Biomechanical Engineering at Trinity College Dublin, focusing on abdominal wall mechanics during laparoscopic surgery. His mechanical engineering background, incorporating advanced computer-aided engineering methods, provides a foundation for his computational expertise. Mathew has a research interest in developing sophisticated machine learning models for healthcare applications, particularly predictive modelling in perioperative medicine.Current projects include advanced predictive analytics for surgical outcomes, exploring the role of early epidurals in obese parturients, and pain management following childbirth using very large datasets of routinely collected healthcare data, effectively bridging the gap between clinical practice and computational engineering.

He completed his training in Aberdeen before undertaking a fellowship in echocardiography and adult congenital heart disease (ACHD) in Edmonton, Canada. He runs the ACHD clinic in Lothian and has an interest in obstetric cardiology. He has been a member of the steering group of the Scottish Obstetric Cardiology Network and a sub-group for pre-conception counselling.

His research spans the laboratory and the clinic, combining molecular, epidemiology and clinical investigation. He applies this strategy to improving diagnosis, treatment, and outcomes for people with brain tumours, traumatic brain injury and spinal fractures. Paul has collaborated with Professor Sir Graham Teasdale, co-developer of the Glasgow Coma Scale, on projects to develop the use of the Glasgow Coma Scale, GCS. This has led to development of the GCS Aid, GCS Pupils Score and GCS verbal component imputation tool. www.glasgowcomascale.org

He is Chief Investigator/Co-I on several UK clinical trials, including the Duration of External Neck Stabilisation study, and EMBRACE, a UK/European device registration study for a liquid biopsy test for brain cancer. Complementing his clinical work, in 2012 Paul co-founded eoSurgical Ltd a University of Edinburgh spin-out that provides surgical simulation training around the world.

www.linkedin.com/in/paul-brennan-1b726530

In 2024 she won « The doctor award » at Scotland’s Health Awards for leadership in maternity services.

He gave up anaesthesia practice to concentrate on his clinical duties on the Adult Critical Care Unit at the Royal London Hospital and his research into improving patient outcomes following major surgery. Rupert has played a leading role in a number of large multi-centre trials, and a large part of his research takes place in the global health context. Together with Prof Bruce Biccard, he is joint lead of the NIHR Global Health Research Group on Perioperative & Critical Care.

Rupert Pearse MD FRCA FFICM, Professor & Consultant in Intensive Care Medicine, NIHR Senior Investigator

Queen Mary University of London and Barts Health NHS Trust (qmul.ac.uk/ccpmg/)