Once again, Royal North Shore Hospital celebrated the Harry Cumberland Travelling Scholarship and the Ray Hollings Surgical Excellence Award with over 80 attendees.
Both awards were established through generous philanthropic donations from the surgeons they are named after and are offered annually to promote surgical innovation, research and quality improvement.
Interim NSLHD Chief Executive Lee Gregory acknowledged the significant contribution both Dr Cumberland and Dr Hollings made throughout their combined century long surgical careers, and expressed appreciation for their ongoing support and generosity to enable these awards.
“These awards enable us as an organisation to recognise the achievements of some of our very talented clinicians by supporting quality improvement projects or research studies that contribute to better patient outcomes and excellence in surgical practice,” he said.
“Congratulations to each recipient of these prestigious awards.”
Dr Ray Hollings and his family were also in attendance this year to present recipients with their awards.
Mr Trevor Danos, NSLHD Board Chair, closed the evening, commenting on the high quality of all applications received for these awards and how they drive the exceptional level of surgical care delivered across NSLHD.
Congratulations all 2023 award recipients
The Harry Cumberland Travelling Scholarship
Recipient: Dr Alex Papachristos received $5000 for his study “A novel cyto-immunotherapy for advanced medullary thyroid cancer”, supervised by Professor Stan Sidhu.
Runner up: Dr Calvin Park for his study “Rome IV physiology criteria for a functional defecation disorder may help select patients that respond to biofeedback however current symptom criteria could be improved”, supervised by Dr Alison Malcolm.
Dr Ray Hollings Surgical Excellence Award recipients
Clinical Associate Professor Mark Sywak received $10,000 for his study: “Radio-Frequency Ablation for the management of benign thyroid nodular disease”.
Dr Amanda Chung received $5000 for her study, a randomised control trial between John Hunter and Royal North Shore Hospital titled: “Improving surgical patient comprehension and communication”
Dr Leo Pang received $5000 for his project: “Pioneering ahead and neck cancer screening program at Royal Northshore hospital”.
The event was jointly hosted by the RNSH Surgical Education Research & Training (SERT) Institute and the Department of Gastroenterology.
