Clinical Centre

Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children (GOSH) is the largest paediatric hospital in the UK, and one of the largest in Europe. GOSH interacts on all aspects of clinical research with the Institute of Child Health (ICH), a department of the University College London, focusing on both basic and clinical research related to children. It is the largest UK centre specialising in research of childhood conditions and in the recent UK RAE in 2008, 70% of staff were rated as of international quality (4*, 40%; 3* 30%). The Academic Cardiovascular Unit within GOSH, has considerable strength in clinical and basic cardiovascular science and a particularly strong clinical track record in the management of children and adults with congenital heart disease. The Unit is split into 6 research themes: Structural heart disease, vascular biology, imaging and morphology, pulmonary hypertension (national reference centre for children), heart muscle diseases (including transplantation – largest pediatric centre in the world) and clinical outcomes. Each theme is lead by an academic clinician, who bridges the gap between basic and clinical research, enabling quick translation of research into daily clinical practice. 

GOSH will contribute as a member of the ESPOIR clinical network and will implant 25 DHV for pulmonary valve replacement within the clinical trial and procure homografts via domino transplantation. Work for the project will be conducted under the leadership of Mr. Victor Tsang at the Centre for Cardiovascular MR. The Centre for Cardiovascular MR is managed through the Cardiovascular Unit, and has proved vital for the continuing research output of the whole department. The unit has been at the forefront of treating and assessing patients with right ventricular outflow tract dysfunction over the last 5 years, developing both surgical and percutaneous pulmonary valve implantation techniques. Moreover, methods to assess new technologies and devices to fit dilated outflow tracts have been developed. The department also has experience in working in a previous collaborative project under FP6 – Health-e-Child – which aimed to combine imaging, patient and genetic data in a number of pediatric conditions, including congenital heart disease. The new technologies proposed in the ESPOIR application will be a continuation of these developments and may potentially impact not only surgical homograft implantation, but also the implantation of percutaneous valves in all valve positions.

Contributors to ESPOIR 

Mr. Victor Tsang, Head of Congenital Cardiothoracic Surgery       
Prof. Andrew Taylor, Professor of Cardiovascular Imaging                        
Dr. Sachin Khambadkone, Consultant Cardiologist
Dr. Hanna Jensen, Pediatric Cardiac Surgery Research Fellow