The Baird Institute

Fifth Anniversary Dinner

29th March

Doltone House, on the finger wharf at Pyrmont, was the venue for our fifth anniversary celebrations.

The evening began with cocktails and canapes on the deck followed by a sit down dinner and presentations.

Our Chairman, Assoc Professor Paul Bannon, presented a brief history of Royal PrinceAlfredHospital, Professor Douglas Baird and the students who have passed through the Institute and their achievements over the last five years.

Paul also paid tribute to Mr Bill Higgins, declaring him a member of the Chairman's Council. Bill is a patient of Assoc Professor Brian McCaughan who performed a pleuropneumonectomy on Bill to treat his mesothelioma. Bill has donated a considerable amount of money to the Institute for which we are eternally grateful.

Adam Spencer, our guest speaker, recounted his long association with the Baird family, the Institute and his courtship of his wife.

After a video presentation, courtesy of the RPA program, thanks to Carol and Penny, Adam interviewed two of the patients seen in the video, Grace and Finola.

Grace appeared in the very first episode of RPA when Professor Baird implanted her first defibrillator in 1995. Dr Bayfield has since replaced it and she is still doing very well.

Finola is also a patient of Brian McCaughan and she too had a pleuropneumonectomy to treat mesothelioma.

Grace, Finola and Bill were very brave in sharing their experiences with the group and demonstrated that research and surgery are not just white coats test tubes and operating theatres but it's about people and we saw the human face of what the institute is about.

Our thanks to the 205 guests who attended and whose generosity helped us raise $31,000 on the night.

Dr Yishay Orr Wins Ralph Reader Prize

2006-09-22

As we get older the chance of needing heart surgery grows. If we need heart valve surgery alone the risk of dying is 0.6%. At an average retirement age of 65 years Australian men and women often need heart bypass surgery. With modern techniques and intensive care skills the risk of this major procedure is now as low as 1.2% of death combined with an excellent long term outlook compared with other procedures. However if we live long enough to require both heart valve and bypass surgery the risk increases 12 times! The reasons for this dramatic rise in risk are complex but no doubt are related to the longer time needed on the heart lung machine and the difficulty protecting the heart during this time.

The heart and lung machine can cause problems of its own including kidney failure and sometimes even death. The exact mechanism of this damage has, to date, been unclear. The work of Dr Yishay Orr, The Baird Institute and the University of NSW has taken a giant step forward into turning this pathway. Rogue white blood cells within the patients own blood stream are stimulated and released from the bone marrow in the misguided attempt to reject the heart and lung machine but unfortunately end up attacking the patients own body. The importance of Yishay's work was recently recognised in Canberra at the Cardiac Society meeting in August 2006 being awarded the Ralph Reader prize for Clinical Cardiology Research. The future of heart and lung machines and how they are used for an ever increasing complexity of heart surgery will be determined by basic research such as the work done within the group of The Baird Institute.