Media

Next Head of Oxford University’s Medical Sciences Division announced

17 December 2007 

Distinguished neurologist and stroke specialist Professor Alastair Buchan will be the Head of the Medical Sciences Division at Oxford University from October 2008.

Professor Buchan, Professor of Clinical Geratology at the University, is both a clinician who treats stroke patients and a neuroscience researcher, whose laboratory interests have the long-term goal of discovering stroke interventions that will both protect the brain and stimulate recovery. He is a leading figure in the UK stroke strategy and the partnership between the University and the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals Trust.

The University of Oxford is arranged into four academic divisions, of which Medical Sciences is by far the largest, accounting for one third of the University’s total expenditure and two thirds of its external research income. Oxford is ranked third in the world for biomedicine (Times Higher Education Supplement).

The Division is responsible for medical education and encompasses the full range of biomedical research, from basic science through to testing new treatments. The Division has great strength in global health, with vaccines in field trials for TB, HIV and malaria, and programmes in major non-communicable diseases, including the three biggest killers: cancer, heart disease and stroke.

Professor Buchan is currently Head of the John Radcliffe Division of the University’s Nuffield Department of Medicine and is also Director of the Oxford Comprehensive Biomedical Research Centre, a joint research programme between the University and the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals Trust funded by the NIHR.

Professor Buchan joined the University of Oxford in 2005 from the University of Calgary, where he was Head of the Calgary Stroke Programme. With Professor Peter Rothwell and Professor Peter Jezzard he leads the Oxford Acute Stroke Programme, which will bring together different strands of stroke research from across the University to develop a research-driven care programme for stroke patients within Oxford's John Radcliffe Hospital. An important aspect of the Oxford Stroke Programme is a medical imaging centre to be built next to the emergency department at the John Radcliffe, which will allow faster treatment of stroke patients, thus preserving brain function.

Professor Buchan said: ‘Taking the very best fundamental or basic science research and using it to drive changes to clinical care will help us to provide the best health for our patients, and will result in the best possible Divisional environment to which we can recruit the best and brightest from students to tenured chairs.’

Dr John Hood, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford, said: ‘The Medical Sciences Division is world-leading in the quality and global impact of its research, from basic science through to treatment, and it is fitting that it will be led by Professor Buchan, who is a scientist and clinician of international repute. I very much look forward to working with him in his new capacity.’

Trevor Campbell Davis, Chief Executive of the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals Trust, said: ‘The NHS in Oxfordshire is pleased that an experienced clinician who understands the needs of patients has been appointed to lead the Medical Sciences Division. I am personally delighted that someone as able as Alastair will be working with me to lead the vital partnership between the Trust and University at this time of change and opportunity.’

Professor Buchan is a fellow of Green College and Governor of Repton School. He takes up post in October 2008. He will succeed Dr Ken Fleming, who has led the Division since 2000.

For more information or for a photograph of Professor Buchan please contact the Press Office, University of Oxford, 01865 280532, press.office@admin.ox.ac.uk

Notes to Editors

*A full list of departments in the Medical Sciences Division can be found here: www.ox.ac.uk/divisions/medical_sciences.html

*Alastair Buchan biography:

Professor Buchan returned to Oxford in 2005 having spent more than 20 years in North America.

He was at school at Repton, and studied at Cambridge, Oxford and Harvard. He did his medical residency training in neurology at University Hospital in London, Ontario. Following speciality training he was awarded an MRC centennial fellowship to study cerebral metabolism at Cornell University in Neurology at the New York hospital. He was subsequently awarded a scholarship by the Heart and Stroke Foundation of Ontario as an Assistant Professor in Neurology at UWO and subsequently as Associate Professor in Neurology and Neuroscience at the University of Ottawa, where he held an appointment with the National Research Council.

In 1995 he was appointed to the Heart and Stroke Foundation Professorship of Stroke Research at the University of Calgary and became Head of the Calgary Stroke Programme. He developed a fully comprehensive stroke programme and redeveloped his laboratory with an experimental imaging centre. His translational clinical research with a high field imaging centre was based in the Emergency Department of the Foothills Hospital in Calgary.

In 2004, Professor Buchan was elected to the Chair of Clinical Geratology at the University of Oxford, taking up post in 2005. In 2005 the Acute Stroke Programme was launched at the John Radcliffe Hospital and in 2006 a Wellcome Clinical Research Facility was awarded to the University of Oxford and ORHT, to a team of neurologists, stroke physicians, cardiologists and imaging scientists to develop a combined high field MR and 3D Angio Suite in the Emergency Department of the John Radcliffe Hospital. 

As a result of this synergy between the University and the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals Trust, Professor Buchan was asked to lead an application for Comprehensive Biomedical Research Centre status, which was awarded by the Department of Health in December 2006. Professor Buchan was appointed Director of the Biomedical Research Centre in June 2007.

Professor Buchan has laboratory interests in understanding neuronal susceptibility with the long-term goal of discovering interventions that will both neuroprotect and stimulate recovery following ischaemic brain injury.

In April 2007 Professor Buchan was made a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (FMedSci). He has been a Consultant Neurologist since 1988 at a number of hospitals and holds the position of Honorary Consultant at the John Radcliffe. He has published over 200 peer-reviewed papers and won numerous honours and awards for both his research and his clinical practice.

 

For more Information