Location, location, location – The social factors making a difference to kidney health.

Many of us don’t fully understand what our kidneys are for or how they work, but they are important to all of us. A team of us a CLAHRC Wessex have been conducting a big research project to find out more about something called ‘Acute kidney injury’, which is when the kidney suddenly stops working properly. This can make people very ill by causing a build-up of waste products in the blood and upsetting the balance of fluids in the body. As a result, people with acute kidney injury can have longer hospital stays and can experience serious consequences, such as needing dialysis or even dying.

Are you 1 of the MISSING 200? – Tackling the Hepatitis C virus by Bicycle

I’m Ryan Buchanan, a specialist registrar doctor in liver disease and a PhD student carrying out research for NIHR CLAHRC Wessex. My project is centred on Hepatitis C in the Isle of Wight community.

Hepatitis C is a virus, which unlike other viruses such as ‘flu’ or the common cold directly affects your liver. It is usually passed from person to person via blood and develops into a long lasting infection. The virus actually causes very few symptoms allowing it to hide within the body making people unaware they carry it.