Schemes for Engineers in Research and Development

RAEng/EPSRC Research Fellowships: Profiles

Dr Ruth Wilcox - University of Leeds

Vertoplasty: innovations in cement application

Background

Dr Dr Ruth Wilcox won her EPSRC/Royal Academy of Engineering Fellowship in 2002. Her research is focussed on a new kind of treatment for spinal fractures. The treatment, called ‘vertebroplasty’, is a keyhole surgery technique that involves the injection of a cement material into the fractured vertebra. Once set, the cement stabilises the fracture site and significantly reduces the pain associated with the injury. Vertebroplasty is used for the treatment of compression fractures of the spine. There are over 120,000 such fractures each year in the UK, commonly as a result of osteoporosis. Other, more invasive, treatments are often not suitable for these patients because of their frailty and lack of bone strength. However, there are several complications associated with vertebroplasty. Ruth’s research is focussed on how the technique can be optimised to reduce the likelihood of these complications occurring. In the course of the Fellowship, she has developed both experimental and computational models of the spine and of the cement injection process, which have enabled the potential complications to be more clearly identified and new processes to be investigated. The models are also now being used for a number of other applications including studies of disc and total hip replacements.

Impact

During the Fellowship, Ruth been successful in obtaining a number of grants which has enabled her to establish her own area of research, and she has developed several new national and international collaborations that have led to joint grant proposals and publications. Ruth also become actively involved in public awareness activities and in promoting engineering to the wider community. Although she is based within the School of Mechanical Engineering, she works within the interdisciplinary Institute of Medical and Biological Engineering. This has been beneficial both to herself, in providing access to the extensive facilities and expertise, and she believes, now also to the Institute itself as she develops this new area of research within its portfolio. The multidisciplinary nature of the group has also enabled her to work closely with clinicians and industrial collaborators. The Fellowship has been crucial to all her activities in allowing her the freedom to develop an area in which she had a particular interest and providing time to concentrate purely on research at this early stage of her academic career.

The Future

As for what next? The Fellowship has enabled Ruth to gain the critical mass needed to take this research forward far beyond the five years. She hopes that the tools, expertise and collaborations developed will lead to innovative and more effective treatments for a whole range of patients in years to come.

 

 

Updated August 2009

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