CPFT joins new partnership boosting technologies to transform brain healthcare
CPFT is one of the local health partners joining a multi-million-pound, three-year collaboration with the Advanced Research and Invention Agency (ARIA), the UK Government’s new research funding arm, to innovate brain healthcare.
Cambridge life sciences, technology and business partners combine forces to form one of ARIA’s national Activation Partners helping to boost progress on a new generation of neuro-technologies designed to treat conditions such as depression, dementia, chronic pain, epilepsy and injuries to the nervous system.
CPFT is working with ARIA, Babraham Research Campus, the University of Cambridge, Cambridge University Health Partners, Cambridge Network, Cambridge Neuroscience, the Milner Therapeutics Institute, the Maxwell Centre and Vellos to unlock more treatments with fewer side-effects and develop personalised brain health care which can be available to everyone.
They will support UK innovators from any background with a highly ambitious concept for technology that could revolutionise brain healthcare, who need funding, space and mentoring to develop their ideas. The very best will be offered the resources and expertise to test and then scale up their idea at pace, to benefit NHS patients and healthcare service users around the world.
CPFT is the only mental health and community NHS Trust involved in this UK partnership and our Research and Development Director Dr Ben Underwood (pictured above, fourth right with the ARIA partnership team) is the clinical lead for Cambridge. CPFT will help to support and develop projects and people funded by the awards, particularly through staff and patient engagement, linking to other NHS organisations in the region and across the UK.
Dr Ben Underwood, Honorary Consultant Psychiatrist at Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust and Associate Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Cambridge (left) said: “Physical and mental illnesses and diseases that affect the brain such as dementia are some of the biggest challenges we face both as individuals and as a society. This funding will bring together different experts doing radical things at the very limits of science and developing new technology to improve healthcare. We hope this new partnership with the NHS will lead to better care and treatment for people experiencing health conditions.”
Neurological and mental health disorders will affect four in every five people in their lifetimes, and present a greater overall health burden than cancer and cardiovascular disease combined. For example, twenty-eight million people in the UK are living with chronic pain and one point three million people with traumatic brain injury.
Neuro-technology – where technology is used to control the nervous system - has the potential to deliver revolutionary new treatments for these disorders, in much the same way that heart pacemakers, cochlear implants and spinal implants have transformed medicine in recent decades. These technologies also have the potential to treat autoimmune disorders, including rheumatoid arthritis, Crohn’s disease and type-1 diabetes.
Original thinking is in the DNA of both ARIA and Cambridge, so this new partnership will consider supporting any precise neuro-technology with the potential to solve a global health problem. It could be in the form of electronic brain implants that reset abnormal brain activity or help deliver targeted drugs more effectively, brain-computer interfaces that control prosthetic limbs, new gene therapies, or cutting-edge technologies that train the patient’s own cells to fight disease.
ARIA’s Scalable Neural Interfaces opportunity space is exploring ways to make the technology more precise, less invasive, and applicable to a broader range of diseases.
George Malliaras, FRS, Prince Philip Professor of Technology at the University of Cambridge said: “Miniaturised devices have the potential to change the lives of millions of people currently suffering from neurological conditions and diseases where drugs have no effect. But we are working at the very edge of what is possible in medicine, and it is hard to find the support and funding to try radical, new things. That is why the partnership with ARIA is so exhilarating, because it will empower us to give brilliant people the tools to turn their original ideas into scalable, commercially viable devices that can have a global impact.”
Kristin-Anne Rutter, Executive Director of Cambridge University Health Partners said: “This is an incredibly exciting and unique partnership that is all about turning radical ideas into practical, low-cost solutions that change lives. Cambridge is fielding its best team to make this work and using its networks to bring in the best people from all over the UK. From brilliant scientists to world-leading institutes, hospitals and business experts, everyone in this collaboration is committed to the ARIA partnership because, by working together, we all see an unprecedented opportunity to make a real difference in the world.”
The three-year partnership is made up of two programmes:
The Fellowship Programme (up to 18 fellowships)
The Ecosystem Programme
The Ecosystem Programme is about creating a vibrant, UK-wide neurotechnology community where leaders from business, science, engineering, academia and the NHS can meet, spark ideas and form collaborations. This will involve quarterly events in Cambridge, road trip events across the UK and access to the thriving online Cambridge network, Connect: Health Tech.
For more information visit the ARIA website: www.aria.org.uk
