In this undergraduate final year project chemical inhibitors of cellular transcription and protein synthesis were used to determine the turnover rates of the highly uncharacterised RA susceptibility molecule, C5orf30. This project provided novel and important insights into the expression kinetics of this gene.
This international student placement looked at the gene expression of different C5orf30 transcript variants across cells from patients with RA and healthy controls. The expression levels of individual transcript variants, which differ only in their regulatory elements, were correlated with the donor genotype at the RA susceptibility locus C5orf30 rs26232. This preliminary data provided the basis for a now much expanded study.
This Student Summer Research Awards (SSRA) project hypothesised that genetic variants impact the invasiveness of the synovial fibroblasts in Rheumatoid Arthritis. Preliminary data generated from this project identified a potential new biomarker for stratifying patients based on severity of disease.
A significant proportion of children with Down Syndrome have inflammatory arthritis. Despite this prevalence, however, it is often missed, delaying primary care diagnosis. Affected people can have reduced verbal communication or may not express pain. This UCD SSRA project aimed to develop creative ways to raise awareness in the medical, health and social care communities, including physician information leaflets and videos.
This UCD SSRA project explored the motivations, experiences and attitudes of people with arthritis who choose to attend (or not to attend) a Chronic Disease Self-Management Programme in Ireland. It also aimed to build a socio-demographic profile of these groups.
An online questionnaire was designed to survey people with all forms of arthritis in Ireland to understand what motivated them to attend or why they had never attended. The survey incorporated open-ended questions and data was analysed both qualitatively and quantitatively. The research process included Public and Patient Involvement (PPI) where the student researcher collaborated with a patient partner to gather feedback on the survey design and dissemination.
The World Health Organization (WHO) recognizes the environments that we inhabit and interact with as important determinants of health. The aim of this Erasmus placement project was to develop a self-management intervention for people with fibromyalgia, focussing on how environments can be used to support health and well-being. Patient and public involvement were central to the research process in this project; the researcher worked in partnership with people with lived experience of the condition to inform both the research design and the development of the intervention components.
Researcher details: Patricia Darcy, PhD student Staffordshire University (patricia.darcy@research.staffs.ac.uk)
