How Patient Are You?

Every three seconds a person breaks a bone due to increased bone fragility. Fragile bones break easily and are also more difficult to repair. Teams at the University of Portsmouth are developing new engineered materials that substitute bone, until complete healing has taken place and with state of the art facilities they simulate what would happen to these materials once in the body to evaluate the quality of the repair bone.This talk will explore these new methods and opportunities in the future.

Artificial arms have a long history: from the fearsome hook and peg leg of seafarers of old to the bionic limbs of prosthetic supermen of modern fiction. But what is the reality for a modern user of an artificial arm? The press has many uplifting stories of 3D printed limbs but is this something that can work every day for a person who just wants to get on with their lives? This talk will look into the technology and the challenges of adapting great ideas to practical devices. It tries to answer the question: Captain Hook or Luke Skywalker?

Advancing years bring two things: grey hairs and a weak bladder. We accept both, but while the grey hair can be dyed, a loss of bladder function impacts patients, carers and society. As current methods for diagnosing the causes of bladder diseases are lacking, scientists have been developing new methods that are able to diagnose bladder disease earlier, more accurately and from a patient’s urine. With early diagnosis and appropriate treatment, maybe all we will have to worry about are the grey hairs.