Dissemination Day at the Botnar Research Centre

Very well done to Programme for Early Researchers in Chiropractic, PERC 2019 interns – Sam Ogilvie, Savanna Koebisch and Perttu Riipinen – who presented their projects at today’s Research Dissemination Day at the Botnar Research Centre, Nuffield Department of Orthopaedics, Rheumatology and Musculoskeletal Sciences, University of Oxford.

Sam, Perttu and Savanna have been participating in an established new-graduate internship programme, run by Versus Arthritis Centre for Sports, Exercise and Osteoarthritis Research at the University of Nottingham, for the last 8 weeks. This scheme has provided them with a unique opportunity to acquire essential research skills, and introduced them to a wide-reaching network of professional researchers and associated healthcare professionals, a network they can work with in years to come. They have attended research training days at each of the affiliated UK institutions – Loughborough, Leeds, Bath, Nottingham, Southampton and Oxford – each with their own prestigious reputation in MSK research, and conducted their own research studies.

Their presentations were excellent – high calibre, professional, informative and highly relevant – investigating i) reasons why patients sought out chiropractic care, ii) the importance of communication of the patient’s pain, exercise and self-management with the chiropractic patient, and iii) healthcare demographics, patient needs and service provision for MSK complaints in rural areas. All three presentations were delivered brilliantly – and would be well-placed at any researchers’ day – watch out for these three in years to come, as lead authors in peer-reviewed journals and at plenary platform presentations!

Huge congratulations to Perttu, Sam and Savanna who now embark on their clinical careers – one that we very much hope will include a large component of research! Well done, and good luck!

Our thanks too to their supervisors (Dave Newell, Michelle Holmes, David Byfield and Alister du Rose) at Welsh Institute Of Chiropractic, AECC University College and University of Southampton – these interns are a huge credit to your institutions and a very welcome addition to our profession.