The research within the Academic Unit of Ophthalmology is supported by the Department of Clinical Sciences South Bristol within the Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry and also within the infection and immunity theme of the Department of Cellular and Molecular Medicine in the Faculty of Medical Sciences. We now have fully refurbished laboratories at both the School of Medical Sciences and the Bristol Eye Hospital and have recently moved staff into new state of the art laboratories for our Corneal Banking Service at the Bristol Eye Hospital.
Ophthalmic research at Bristol has strategic core groups, with overall direction from Head of Research for Ophthalmology and Department of Clinical Sciences South Bristol, Professor Andrew Dick. Core groups exist with the expertise to broaden investigations into the understanding of maintenance of health of the ocular surface and cornea (Professor John Armitage, Dr Monica Berry and Dr Val Smith), how the eye combats infection and inflammation (Professor Andrew Dick, Dr Lindsay Nicholson, Dr Sue Nicholls, Dr Richard Lee), corneal transplant rejection (Professor Andrew Dick and Dr Sue Nicholls) and inherited genetic disorders and retinal cell biology and development (Dr Amanda Churchill and Dr Denize Atan). We now have active neural progenitor/stem cell groups in collaboration with Dr Maeve Caldwell and Professor James Uney investigating retinal remodelling (Professor Andrew Dick, Dr Tina Qiu, Debra Carter). Human translational studies are possible because we also house the UK’s largest corneal and tissue bank under the direction of Professor John Armitage.
Finally, we are able to progress with early phase bench to bedside investigations as well as major phase II and III studies in the Clinical Research Unit based at the Bristol Eye Hospital (Head: Professor Andrew Dick), which is supported by the clinical expertise of University Staff (Dr Richard Lee) and Consultant NHS staff (Miss Clare Bailey, Mr Mo Majid, Mr Jeremy Diamond, Dr Paul Spry).
Bristol Eye Hospital continues with active epidemiological research programmes directed by consultant staff, Miss Cathy Williams and Mr John Sparrow on determining quality of life, evidence base for therapies, ocular and visual development in children and pathways of improved health care delivery. This is in collaboration with Departments of Community Medicine and Departments of Social Medicine that has provided a successful partnership for many years.