Conversations in Fetal Medicine

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Welcome to the third episode of season two of Conversations in Fetal Medicine, where we talk to Professor Jan Deprest.

Jan Deprest is a leading international fetal surgeon who works two days a week at UCLH as a consultant and at UCL as a professor of obstetrics and gynaecology. At UCL he works in the Institute for Women's Health and the Translational Imaging Group. For the rest of the week he works at his home institutions, at the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven and its University Hospitals Leuven (Belgium). Professor Deprest is currently the academic chair of the Department of Development and Regeneration and director of the Centre for Surgical Technologies.

Clinically he is the director of the fetal surgery programme in Leuven. He trained in fetal medicine in Leuven (Belgium), St George’s Hospital London (UK), Leiden (Holland) and attended the programme at Children’s Hospital Philadelphia (PA, USA). He established the Eurofoetus consortium, which is dedicated to the development of instruments and techniques for minimally invasive fetal and placental surgery. The Leuven Fetal Medicine Team focuses on antenatal modulation of lung development, e.g. for pulmonary hypoplasia due to congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH) as well as for bronchopulmonary dysplasia. He has headed several clinical studies dedicated to the prenatal prediction of survival of fetuses with isolated CDH using genetic testing, ultrasound and fetal MRI imaging. He developed a percutaneous method for fetoscopic placement of a balloon into the fetal trachea (FETO). His translational research also investigates the application of amniotic fluid derived stem cells for treating fetuses or neonates with CDH or other lung disorders, fetal membrane wound healing and brain development in fetuses exposed to steroids or anesthesia.
Bio from UCLH: https://www.uclh.nhs.uk/our-services/find-consultant/professor-jan-deprest
Bio from KU Leuven: https://www.kuleuven.be/wieiswie/en/person/00031972
ORCID record (to see his many publications): https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4920-945X
We have not included any patient identifiable information, and this podcast is intended for professional education rather than patient information (although welcome anyone interested in the field to listen). Please get in touch with feedback or suggestions for future guests or topics: [email protected], or via Twitter (X) or Instagram via @fetalmedcast.
Music by Crowander ('Acoustic romance') used under creative commons licence. Podcast created, hosted and edited by Dr Jane Currie.

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Welcome to season 1 of Conversations in Fetal Medicine, a podcast about the people who work in this field. This episode is an interview with Professor Christoph Lees. We talked about his path into fetal medicine, its challenges and joys, some of the research he's been involved with including the TRUFFLE study and High Intensity Focussed Ultrasound (HIFU), training, and his tips for people working in fetal medicine. See below for a more detailed biography.
We have not included any patient identifiable information, and this podcast is intended for professional education rather than patient information. Please get in touch with feedback or suggestions for future guests or topics: [email protected].
Music by Crowander ('Acoustic romance') used under creative commons licence. Podcast created, hosted and edited by Dr Jane Currie.
Christoph is Professor of Obstetrics as Imperial College London; Honorary Consultant in Obstetrics and Head of Specialty for Fetal Medicine at the Centre for Fetal Care, Queen Charlotte’s and Chelsea Hospital, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust; Clinical Director for Fetal Medicine for North West London and Visiting Professor KU Leuven (Belgium).
Christoph qualified from Guy's Hospital, London in 1990. Following subspecialty accreditation in fetal-maternal medicine at King's College Hospital, London he established the fetal medicine unit at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge in 2001 and inaugurated the RCOG MFM subspecialty programme in 2006.

His research interest is on fetal assessment and in particular the use of Doppler ultrasound to assess the health of the baby, scanning in labour, and non-invasive fetal surgery. He is the Chief Investigator of The Trial of Umbilical and Fetal Flow in Europe (TRUFFLE), a Collaboration of 51 Centres across Europe; co-founder of the International Working Group of Maternal Haemodynamics and Intrapartum ultrasound ISLANDs group. He is a Board member of the International Society of Ultrasound in Obstetrics and Gynaecology (ISUOG) 2015-2023, is chairman of the ISUOG Doppler and vascular imaging group and member then chair of the ISUOG Safety Committee (2018-2022).

Professor Lees was awarded £2.2m grant from the Medical Research Council for first in human studies of high-intensity focused ultrasound in 2017, a £2.5m grant from the NIHR in 2019 to undertake the TRUFFLE 2 RCT and a £2.1M grant from the NIHR for a study on ultrasound of breech pregnancy at 36 weeks in 2023. In 2020 Professor Lees was awarded £253k by the MRC for the PANCOVID project, a Global registry of women affected by COVID-19 during pregnancy. He has published widely in scientific journals and has authored textbooks on fetal growth restriction, maternal haemodynamics and the widely read Dewhurst’s Textbook of Obstetrics & Gynaecology.

He has a strong interest in healthcare funding, medical regulatory issues and mentorship. With Professor Steve Smith, he set up the campaign group Doctors for Reform (2003-2011) comprising 1000 senior doctors that argued for a European type social health insurance system to supplement the NHS tax funded model. He has written papers for Civitas and Reform on the feasibility of this approach. He has written widely on GMC reform, was a consultant staff council mentor at Addenbrooke’s (2010-2013), Chair of the Addenbrooke’s Local Negotiating Committee and is a co-founder of the RCOG Supporting our Doctors group (2017).

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Welcome to the first episode of the second season of Conversations in Fetal Medicine, where we talk to Professor Sally Collins.
Sally is a Consultant Obstetrician subspecializing in Feto-Maternal Medicine
at the John Radcliffe Hospital and a Professor of Obstetrics in the Nuffield
Department of Women’s and Reproductive Health, University of Oxford.
Sally graduated in Medicine from the University of Oxford and specialized in
Obstetrics and Gynaecology, training within the Oxford region during which
time she completed a DPhil in Obstetric Ultrasound. Sally is currently a
Consultant Obstetrician in a busy NHS Trust and has set up the Oxford FMU
tertiary referral Placenta Clinic.
She is highly research active having authored over 150 journal articles, filed
three patents and won several international research awards. She currently
holds several grants including from the NIHR and Sir Jules Thorn Trust to
develop a fully automated first trimester ultrasound screening tool for fetal
growth restriction.
Sally is also world renowned for her expertise in placenta accreta spectrum
(PAS) and is currently working with NHS England to develop a national
network for the diagnosis and management of PAS having co-authored the
RCOG and FIGO guidelines on diagnosis and management of PAS. She is
Chairperson elect of the International Society for PAS and is the lead author
on their recent evidence-based guidelines. She is a founder member of the
Oxford Placenta Accreta team (https://www.placentaaccretasspectrum.com/)
and continues to strive to improve the outcomes for women affected by this
rare, but complex and potentially lethal condition.

Websites with further details about her work and research:
https://www.wrh.ox.ac.uk/team/sally-collins

Her Wikipedia page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sally_Collins

The (fabulous) PAS website we discuss in the episode: https://www.placentaaccretasspectrum.com/
We have not included any patient identifiable information, and this podcast is intended for professional education rather than patient information (although anyone is of course welcome to listen). Please get in touch with feedback or suggestions for future guests or topics: [email protected], or via Twitter (X) or Instagram via @fetalmedcast.
Music by Crowander ('Acoustic romance') used under creative commons licence. Podcast created, hosted and edited by Dr Jane Currie.

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Welcome to the fifth episode of season two of Conversations in Fetal Medicine, where we talk to Dr David Coggin-Carr.
David is a UK+US dual-certified obstetrician, subspecialist in Maternal and Fetal Medicine, and early career clinical academic with additional training and expertise in Integrative Medicine and medical acupuncture. He currently practices full-spectrum MFM in both Vermont and upstate New York and additionally serves as Associate Medical Director of the Birthing Center and Associate Director of Quality for Obstetrics at the University of Vermont Medical Center. His clinical interests include planned vaginal breech birth, assisted vaginal birth, fetal growth restriction and electronic fetal monitoring. His research interests are focused on the evidence-based integration of acupuncture and related techniques into conventional maternity care, as well as the exploration of novel applications of acupuncture in animal models of high-risk pregnancy. His lab is currently examining the efficacy, safety and mechanisms of action of electroacupuncture in a rat model of maternal obesity characterized by insulin resistance and uteroplacental insufficiency. He has also served as Editor-in-Chief of the scientific journal Acupuncture in Medicine (published by SAGE and owned by the British Medical Acupuncture Society) since 2015.
After graduating from UCL medical school in 2004, he spent 12 years in UK postgraduate training during which time he was awarded an MSc in Western Medical Acupuncture by the University of Hertfordshire and a PhD in Fetal Medicine from UCL under the supervision of Anna David and Jacqueline Wallace at the University of Aberdeen (to which he relocated for 18 months). His thesis was entitled “Evaluation of
Prenatal Adenoviral Vascular Endothelial Growth Factor Gene Therapy in the Growth-Restricted Sheep Fetus and Neonate”. He began subspecialty training at St George’s, University of London, completed the RCOG ATMs in Maternal Medicine and Advanced Labour Ward Practice and ultimately gained his CCT in general O&G, but subsequently made the decision to emigrate to the USA and retrain in O&G and MFM.
He spent his first year as an intern at NYU (including a stint at Bellevue, the USA’s oldest public hospital) and then moved on to the University of Vermont for a further three years’ of Ob/Gyn residency followed by three years’ of MFM fellowship. While finally working in a substantive post (as an attending physician and Assistant Professor), he is currently rounding out 20 years’ of postgraduate training by completing a 1-year faculty fellowship in Integrative Medicine through the Osher Collaborative for Integrative Health.

We have not included any patient identifiable information, and this podcast is intended for professional education rather than patient information (although welcome anyone interested in the field to listen). Please get in touch with feedback or suggestions for future guests or topics: [email protected], or via Twitter (X) or Instagram via @fetalmedcast.
Music by Crowander ('Acoustic romance') used under creative commons licence. Podcast created, hosted and edited by Dr Jane Currie.

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Welcome to the fifth and final episode of this first season of Conversations in Fetal Medicine, where we talk to Professor Mark Kilby.
In his present role, Professor Kilby works within the Medical Genomics Research Group within Illumina with members both within Cambridge and San Diego. The Group Leader is Dr David Bentley, Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer, who was one of the principal researchers involved in using next generation sequencing to unlock information of the human genome and then to apply this to the 100,000 genome project in the UK.

Prof Kilby's role, is to work with many of these clinical scientists, who are experts in sequencing technology and applying whole genome sequencing in medicine but also working on the evaluation and understanding of the information obtained from these technologies by bioinformatic assessment, sorting and classification. His principle area of work within this group is focusing upon the roles of whole genome sequencing in prenatal diagnosis (including carrier status analysis) and also newborn screening.

In addition to his role within Illumina, he still works as a Clinical Consultant at Birmingham Women’s and Children’s Foundation trust (for 2 sessions a month) and continues research within the University of Birmingham, as an Emeritus Professor.

He is Chair of the RCOG Genomics Taskforce and works with other Royal Colleges, as well as NHS England and Genomics England.
We have not included any patient identifiable information, and this podcast is intended for professional education rather than patient information. Please get in touch with feedback or suggestions for future guests or topics: [email protected].
Music by Crowander ('Acoustic romance') used under creative commons licence. Podcast created, hosted and edited by Dr Jane Currie.