Trainee led Surgical Research through the Clinical Trials Network of Australia and New Zealand (CTANZ)
CTANZ is a bold new key RACS initiative to pioneer and drive the development of clinical trials networks across Australia and New Zealand. This unprecedented opportunity is offered to trainees, prevocational doctors and medical students with passion and drive.
We invite you to step up, lead and direct multi centred trials and studies that will improve patient care.
Adapted from the Clinical Trials Network-UK model for Australasia, you work collaboratively to deliver large scale research studies. A publication model which ensures that all contributors are recognised as part of a PubMed listed citable group authorship has been developed to ensure all network contributors can claim a publication on their CV.
CTANZ believes you can lead the way with practice changing surgical research. If you share this vision and want to engage we want to hear from you. Please contact us at CTANZ@surgeons.org so we can support you.
Clinical Director (Professor David Watson) and CTANZ Coordinator (Dr Lorwai Tan).
GlobalSurg
GlobalSurg was established to support collaborative international research into surgical outcomes by fostering local, national and international research networks. It now represents over 5000 clinicians in more than 100 countries and their international cohort studies are open to all collaborators, including medical students, clinical officers, doctors, nurses and researchers. The studies are designed to ensure easy delivery and every researcher who contributes data will be a PubMed-citable collaborator on papers.
GlobalSurg 1 was conducted in 2014 to identify the international variation in outcomes of emergency intra-abdominal surgery in order to determine whether quality improvement strategies are needed in acute surgical units. This study was published in The British Journal of Surgery in 2016.
GlobalSurg 2 was conducted in 2016 and aimed to determine worldwide 30-day surgical site infection (SSI) rates following gastrointestinal surgery. This study was published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases in 2018.
GlobalSurg 3 was conducted in 2018 to evaluate the international quality of gastric, breast and colorectal cancer surgery using 30-day surgical outcomes.
To read more about GlobalSurg and their past studies and publications, please visit https://globalsurg.org/.
The Student Audit and Research in Surgery (STARSurg) Collaborative
The Student Audit and Research in Surgery (STARSurg) collaborative is a national, student-led audit and research network with representation from medical schools across the UK, Ireland and other countries around the world. It empowers students to participate in high quality academic projects, forming links with supervising junior doctors and consultants and receiving PubMed-citable co-authorship.
Through this, students contribute data to national studies while gaining an understanding of clinical academia, audit and research methodology, and ethical considerations.
- RECON is being conducted in 2019 to explore the incidence of post-operative pulmonary complications (PPCs) following major abdominal and incisional hernia surgery. Furthermore, this project will evaluate adherence to perioperative PPC prevention measures and establish risk factors for development of PPCs.
- IMAGINE was conducted in 2018 as STARSurg’s first international project in collaboration with EuroSurg investigating the incidence and management of postoperative ileus, as well as the safety and impact of NSAIDs on return of bowel function.
- OAKS was conducted in 2015 to audit adherence to guidelines requiring assessment of renal function before and after major gastrointestinal and liver surgery, as well as to identify predictive factors and determine the incidence and morbidity of post-operative AKI.
- DISCOVER was conducted in 2014 to determine whether obesity is associated with an increased risk of major postoperative complications.
- STARSurg 1 was conducted in 2013 as their first national project and involved 258 students from 31 UK medical schools to collect outcomes data over a two-week period on a prospective cohort of 1500 patients across 109 UK hospitals.
To read more about STARSurg and their past studies and publications, please visit https://starsurg.org/
European Student Research Network (EuroSURG)
The European Student Research Network (EuroSURG) is a collaborative medical students’ and surgeons’ network that runs high-quality, multi-centre, international studies.
Following the model of other successful collaboratives such as STARSurg and GlobalSurg, the EuroSURG Collaborative is the first pan-European student and trainee-led surgical research collaborative. It provides an opportunity for students to develop research skills as they contribute to large, international studies capable of improving patient care, whilst also receiving PubMed-citable co-authorship.
EuroSURG promotes education in evidence-based research and aims to develop research networks across Europe.
- IMAGINE was conducted in 2018 as STARSurg’s first international project investigating the incidence and management of postoperative ileus, as well as the safety and impact of NSAIDs on return of bowel function.
To read more about STARSurg and their past studies and publications, please visit https://eurosurg.org/.
