Best student project at surgeons’ conference

28 March 2019

Medicine student Chloe Jackson recently presented her research project on prostate cancer detection and treatment at the International Surgical Conference in Belfast.

Chloe’s project was shortlisted in the top 12 medical student entries and went on to win the conference prize for best student paper. Her research was supported by Hertford’s Vaughan Williams Medical Fund and our clinical medicine tutor, Mr Simon Brewster.

Read Chloe’s report on her trip below:

I attended the International Surgical Conference 2019 run by the Association of Surgeons in Training (ASiT) in Belfast in March 2019. The conference was aimed at surgical trainees and foundation doctors and medical students interested in a surgical career. There were around 900 delegates in total. I was at the conference to present my research on Prostate cancer. This was a project I had been working on for around 8 months with my Clinical Tutor at Hertford – Mr Simon Brewster.

We arrived in Belfast on the Friday morning after a very early flight and took the time to see the sights and to taste the local delicacies – a nice pint of Guinness in Belfast’s oldest pub. After a well-earned rest, we hit the conference on Saturday and enjoyed some excellent talks all with the theme of ‘Innovation in Surgery’. I particularly liked the presentation given by Nadine Hachach-Haram, a plastic surgeon who invented a device that allows surgeons to operate remotely using virtual reality. In the evening, we attended a gala dinner in the beautiful Belfast City hall which was a great opportunity to meet the other delegates.

I presented my project on the Sunday. My project investigated how many men die with a prostate cancer compared to how many men die because of prostate cancer. The aim was to show how common prostate cancer is and how often it is clinically insignificant in a bid to prevent the current over-treatment and over-detection of prostate cancer. Over-detection and over-treatment have serious side-effects for the patient, is costly for the NHS and does not reduce the mortality of prostate cancer.

My abstract had been shortlisted to the top 12 medical student submissions so they asked me to give an oral presentation. The judges liked my work and I won the prize for the best medical student project. I am very proud of my achievement and I am extremely grateful for the support from the Vaughan Williams Medical Fund. Without their support, this wouldn’t have been possible. I would also like to thank my tutor, Mr Brewster, for all of his contributions to this project.