BAHNO Awards

BAHNO Accredited Short Fellowships

BAHNO members may apply for an ASF which offers the successful applicant the opportunity to spend a short but focused period of time at a centre/unit offering a specific learning experience. We are currently proposing a one-month period, but this period can be flexible according to the host unit and applicant.

The 2024 round of fellowships will offer positions as follows:

Clinical Oncology fellowship at The Christie Hospital (Manchester) with the focus being Proton Beam Therapy.
Multidisciplinary fellowship at UCL (London) with exposure to Sentinel Lymph Node Biopsy for Head & Neck aimed at any specialty involved with this technique.

We anticipate that as the period of time is short it will cause minimal disruption at the applicant’s home unit. BAHNO is offering an award of £2500 towards accommodation, travel and necessary expenses.

BAHNO is committed to supporting equality, diversity and Inclusion. Applications are encouraged to reflect the broad community of BAHNO membership and any adjustments to the fellowship required for the candidate will be accommodated.

Applicants should apply to BAHNO (secretariat@bahno.org.uk) with:

A letter explaining their motivation and what they wish to obtain from the fellowship.
The applicant’s up-to-date CV.
Details of two current referees.
Written evidence of provisional approval for them to take time away from their unit if applicable.

The applicant must agree to provide a structured report to BAHNO following the fellowship and should agree to its publication on the BAHNO website.

The closing date for applications is Sunday April 21st 2024 (at midnight). We expect to announce the successful applicants at our annual scientific meeting (17^th May). The detailed plan of timing for the fellowship will be arranged by the applicant and host unit.

BAHNO Research Grant

Description:

Research grants are awarded by BAHNO annually to fund research that substantially contributes to the body of knowledge in head and neck or thyroid cancer, its management and its impact on patients.

Amount:

Up to £6,000 per grant may be available annually. The number of grants administered will depend upon financial resource available.

Eligibility:

The grants are open to BAHNO members only. Those applying must be employed in the UK.

Where the applicant is a medical/surgical trainee, support from the trainers (or the supervisor and trainers) and the clinical director must be obtained. Where the applicant is from an allied health profession and is early in their research career, support from a senior team member / Department Lead and where appropriate Therapies Lead should be obtained.

Any study funded will be expected to receive ethical and R and D approval in the Trust(s) where the research is to be conducted before any grant is given

Requirements:

A proposal and the CV to be submitted to BAHNO secretariat before 21st January annually. Where matched / extended funding is needed to contribute to the project, successful applicants must demonstrate that they have secured the whole funding package before BAHNO funding is released. Recipients must acknowledge BAHNO support in all presentations and academic publications related to the project.

Decision notification date:

All submissions will be acknowledged and a result made within 3 months of the deadline. Results will be formally announced at BAHNO Annual Meeting.

Previous awards:

2023

Karl Payne (University of Birmingham) Genetic polymorphisms as predictive biomarkers of immune-related adverse events in head and neck cancer patients undergoing immune checkpoint therapy

2022

Charleen Chan Wah Hak (The Institute of Cancer Research) to invstigate the dynamics of T-cell-driven immune responses to radiotherapy and immunotherapy in a HPV16 model of head and neck cancer.

2021

Artysha Tailor ( Guy's Hospital) to compare PD-L1 CPS between primary and recurrent specimens following +/- adjuvant therapy.

Justin Roe, Paula Bradley, Paul Carding, John Hardman, Louise Occomore-Kent, Joanne Patterson to explore the views of ENT and GI Specialists on SLT-led clinics as a pathway for patients triaged as ‘low risk’ referred on the 2WW Head and Neck/ Upper GI cancer referral pathway.

2020

Lucinda Gunn (The Royal Marsden Hospital) to complete a retrospective analysis of gustatory outcomes following bilateral versus unilateral radiotherapy to the head and neck.

2019

Paula Bradley (University of Sunderland) to develop tools to predict the risk of diagnosis of head and neck cancer.

Karl Payne (Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Birmingham) to investigate cell-free DNA methylation as a biomarker for HPV risk stratification in head and neck cancer

2018

INTEGRATE (The National ENT Trainee Research Network) for the BAHNO Head & Neck Surveillance Audit 2018

BAHNO Travel Grants

BAHNO offers Travel Grants to help fund a visit for training experience for members of BAHNO. Visits may be to an institution in the UK or abroad. Each award is for a maximum of £2,000; the actual amount to be determined by Council.

Priority will be given to unpaid projects rather than to salaried Fellowships.

An application may be submitted at any time before 21st January. The application will be acknowledged and considered by Council at its next meeting. The awards for the year will be announced at the BAHNO Annual Meeting.

A condition of the award is that the recipient should produce a short written report of their visit for Council; a brief verbal report at the ASM may also be required.

Please send the following to Laura Manning at the BAHNO Secretariat:

Outline of visit with intended purpose
CV
Confirmatory letter from institution(s) to be visited
Letter of support from Lead Trainer or Training Programme Director

Previous awards:

2024

Devvrat Katechia for a one-year fellowship training course in Advanced Reconstructive Microsugery at Bhagwan Mahaveen Cancer Hospital and Research Centre, Jaipur, India.

2023

Takaaki Sato for a 12-month fellowship in reconstructive microsurgery at Chang Gung Memorial Hospital in Taiwan. This fellowship combines an MSc Programme in Reconstructive microsurgery at Chang Gung University.

2022

David Allin (Advanced Head and Neck Fellow at Guy's and St Thomas' Hospital) for a 12-month fellowship starting July 2022 in Advanced Head and Neck (H&N) Surgical Oncology at the Université de Montréal (UdeM), Canada.

Adal Mirza (Surgical Oncology Training Interface Fellow at Guy’s and St Thomas’ Hospital) for a placement at the University of Dalhousie, Head and Neck Surgical Oncology program in Nova Scotia, Canada.

2021

Karan Jolly (ENT trainee, Birmingham) to pursue a 12-month Fellowship in Vancouver in rhinology and anterior skull base surgery.

2020

Jane Dawson (East Grinstead) to help towards expanding the work of SLTs in Ghana: teaching, leading by example and working alongside Ghanaian SLT/ nursing staff in situ. This will also contribute towards the ICOnIC programme ( International Collaboration on improving head and neck cancer outcomes in low and low to middle income countries in the Global South).

2019

Jason Fleming - Fellowship at The University of Alabama

2018

John Collin – visiting the University of Florida

Oliver Dale – visiting the Royal Adelaide Hospital, Australia

Adam Shakir – visiting The Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital, Brisbane, Australia