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SCTS, Ionescu Scholarship for Non-NTN Doctors in Cardiothoracic Surgery, 2016 Thanks to a laudable initiative of the SCTS I was granted a Scholarship aimed to be utilised for further education, training and development of surgical doctors and their teams, and for wider service improvement. Adrian Crucean
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s a Specialty Doctor in Congenital Heart Surgery I developed a particular interest in cardiac morphology. I strongly believe that in the complex field of congenitally malformed hearts, a thorough knowledge of various anatomical patterns is paramount for the formation of accomplished surgeons. Fortuitously my enthusiasm was put to good use at Birmingham Children’s Hospital (BCH) where a remarkable archive of cardiac specimens of almost 2000 hearts has been awaiting for formal analysis, study and classification. The SCTS scholarship could not have been granted at a better time as a proper Curatorial Committee has been set up to overlook the increasing use of this unique collection. Hence, in the past year, the
following objectives have been achieved: the creation of a cardiac morphology laboratory, an increased programme of teaching and education based on the archive, establishing useful professional connection at national and international levels, and the creation of a digital database for this collection. This long standing and dormant archive has been recently audited and reviewed in order to ensure compliance with all necessary legal and governmental requirements. This has been largely based on an extensive analysis of the archive that took place with the support of Professor RH Anderson, the most well-known and widely published cardiac morphologist in the world. Nevertheless, with SCTS support, a complete redevelopment of the area housing the specimens has been achieved including an
AFOS ventilated specimen table, dedicated shelving and individual medical grade containers and labels, formalin-monitored and temperature-controlled in a fully ventilated room. The programme of teaching and education continued throughout the year and was based on lectures, hands-on examination, photographs and audio-video recordings. This is achieved through the full involvement of the BCH Illustration department who use state-of-the-art video and photography equipment. To list but just a few of these activities: West Midlands Cardiothoracic Surgery Regional Training on core curriculum heart pathologies, BCH Annual Workshop on hypoplastic heart syndrome, Morphology and Echocardiography in Neonates and Children Joined BCH and Southampton Children’s Hospital Course, presentation at the British Society of Echocardiography, several in house teaching sessions and grand rounds to surgeons, cardiologists, intensive care doctors and anaesthetists. The collection has been further analysed by Dr Bill Chaudhry from the Institute of Genetic Medicine at Newcastle University who made several presentations based on a particular subgroup of the archive hearts. Two presentations were held at the Annual SCTS Meeting in Birmingham in March 2016 and these were largely based on specimens with arterial valves malformations and transposed hearts with obstructed outlets. There is also an Intercalated Programme in Clinical Anatomy that has been initiated