Clinical trials

In patients with PSC, endoscopic therapy of strictures aims to improve cholestasis by relieving the biliary obstruction via endoscopic biliary dilatation with consideration of plastic stents in strictures refractory to dilatation due to the risk of pancreatitis and cholangitis . Short term stents have been shown to have similar recurrence-free rates compared to dilatation in a randomised control trial; however, this was terminated after interim analysis due to higher rates of serious adverse events in the stent group. The long term benefits are unclear; however, it may lead to improved survival compared to predicted survival. In this group of patients with limited treatment options, biodegradable stents may provide an attractive additional treatment modality in the management of high grade strictures.

This randomised controlled trial aims to investigate the effectiveness of closed-loop automated oxygen control (CLAC) in preterm infants receiving non-invasive respiratory support and determine if it reduces the duration of supplementary oxygen treatment and improves achievement of oxygen saturation targets, reduces the incidences of hypoxia and hyperoxia, the number of manual adjustments to the inspired oxygen concentration (FiO2), and adverse outcomes including bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD). The study will take place at King's College Hospital neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Parents of preterm infants born at less than 34 weeks of gestation and receiving non-invasive respiratory support will be approached, informed and if appropriate consented to join the trial. Participants will be randomised to receiving either automated or manual oxygen control. The study will measure outcomes including the duration of supplementary oxygen treatment, the percentage of time spent within oxygen saturation targets, the incidences of hypoxia and hyperoxia, the number of manual FiO2 adjustments required, the overall duration of non-invasive respiratory support and length of neonatal unit stay, and the incidence of BPD at 36 weeks postmenstrual age (PMA). Results will be compared between the two groups.

Patients Under 12 Weeks Pregnant With a Single Ongoing Pregnancy Attending the EPU Will be Randomly Assigned to Receive Their Personalised Miscarriage Risk Score or Not. The Study Explores Whether Sharing This Score Affects Anxiety and Whether Patients Find the Information Helpful and Acceptable. (PEMPS)

The centre of the retina (macula) at the back of the eye contains cells that give us our central vision that we use for reading and recognising faces. These cells can be damaged by a disease called wet age-related macular degeneration (AMD), where new abnormal blood vessels grow through the macula and leak fluid. This can affect vision. In some cases, wet AMD can also cause a bleed under the macula, known as a submacular haemorrhage (SMH), which can lead to marked and persistent loss of vision in the eye. The current standard treatment for wet AMD is to give injections containing 'anti-VEGF' drugs into the eye. Anti-VEGF drugs reduce the leakage of fluid so that the macula can become dry again and sight can improve. Anti-VEGFs are also the current standard of care for SMH, mainly because there is no licensed treatment for the SMH itself (patients with SMH were excluded from most wet AMD studies). The purpose of this study therefore is to compare two treatments: 1. Standard treatment for wet AMD (anti-VEGF injections). 2. Standard treatment above plus surgery. This study will find out if having surgery alongside anti-VEGF injections can improve vision further over the current standard treatment of anti-VEGF injections alone.

Adrenalectomy is an operation to remove one of the adrenal glands. It is commonly performed to treat adrenal tumours or conditions that cause excess hormone production. The adrenal glands produce important hormones, including cortisol and aldosterone, which help regulate blood pressure, metabolism and the body's response to stress. After adrenalectomy, some patients may develop adrenal insufficiency, a condition in which the body does not produce enough of these essential hormones. In severe cases, this can lead to an Addisonian (adrenal) crisis, a life-threatening emergency that can cause shock, organ failure and death if not treated promptly. The risk of adrenal insufficiency after surgery depends largely on cortisol levels before the operation. In patients with Cushing's syndrome, where there is excessive cortisol production, the risk of adrenal insufficiency after adrenalectomy is almost 100%. For this reason, these patients routinely receive steroid replacement treatment after surgery to replace missing hormones and prevent adrenal crisis. For other patients undergoing adrenalectomy, the best management approach is less clear. Patients with mild autonomous cortisol secretion (MACS) have a moderate risk of adrenal insufficiency - around 50-65%. Patients with normal cortisol secretion (NCS) may also develop adrenal insufficiency because one adrenal gland has been removed, occurring in around 20-37% of cases. International medical guidelines currently disagree on how best to manage these patients after surgery. Some recommend measuring cortisol levels the morning after surgery and treating only if levels are low, while others recommend giving steroid treatment to all patients with mild cortisol excess. There is currently no clear guidance for patients with normal cortisol secretion. This study will compare these management strategies to determine which approach best reduces the risk of adrenal insufficiency after adrenalectomy. The study will be conducted at King's College Hospital and will run for approximately two years.

The goal of this randomised controlled feasibility trial is to find out whether it is possible to run a larger study of the Good Boost+ community based rehabilitation programme for people waiting for a primary total knee replacement. The study will look at how many people are willing to take part, whether they stay in the study, and whether they can follow the Good Boost+ programme as planned. It will also explore how acceptable the programme is to patients, NHS staff and leisure centre staff, and which outcome measures are most useful for a future full scale trial. The study will also look at what helps or hinders delivery of the programme in real world NHS and community settings. The main questions it aims to answer are: * How many people waiting for knee replacement surgery are willing to take part in the study * Whether participants can continue with the Good Boost+ programme as planned over the study period * Which outcome measures best capture any potential benefits of the programme * How acceptable the programme is to patients, NHS and leisure centre staff * What helps or makes it difficult to deliver the programme in practice. Participants will be randomly assigned to one of two groups. * Usual NHS care or * Usual NHS care plus the Good Boost+ programme Participants in the Good Boost+ programme will take part in six weekly group water based exercise sessions held in local swimming pools, as well as land based exercise sessions that can be done individually or by joining a virtual group. The exercise sessions are delivered through Good Boost's digital technology, using small waterproof tablet computers at swimming pools, and smartphones or computers for land-based sessions. Physiotherapy staff will provide guidance throughout, and volunteers will offer refreshments after pool sessions to support social connection. All participants, including those receiving usual NHS care only, will be asked to complete an exercise diary, rate their knee pain each week, and complete short questionnaires at 6 and 10 weeks after joining the study.

This is a feasibility study to assess new, more practical ways of measuring renal reserve.

The goal of this observational study is to learn about the role of electroporation (the use of small electric pulses applied to tissue) in the treatment (ablation) of colorectal polyps. The main questions to answer in this pilot phase of the study are: 1. The safety of pulsed field ablation (PFA) for the removal of colorectal polyps 2. The efficacy and feasibility of PFA in the treatment of colorectal polyps using metrics such as treatment coverage, treatment time, post treatment fibrosis, post treatment recurrence and patient satisfaction

Butterfly glioblastomas (bGBM), defined as tumours crossing the midline to involve hemispheres bilaterally, have a dismal prognosis with a median survival of 3.3-6 months and only 9% of patients with bGBM survive 2-years. These figures put bGBM in the worst end of the spectrum of GBM prognosis, significantly inferior to the survival figures quoted in the literature with standard of care - 14.6 months - particularly when 5-aminolevulinic acid is used as surgical adjuvant - 17.47 months. Despite the poor outcome of this disease, there is preliminary evidence suggesting that active oncology treatment can impact the survival of patients with this condition.With particular regards to surgical resection versus biopsy, there is a suggestion that resection improves overall survival at 6 months with no clear difference at 12 and 18 months of follow up. Laser-induced thermal therapy (LITT) is a minimally invasive laser ablation technique used in a range of brain tumours, including glioblastomas, with similar overall survival to the ones reported for open surgery in patients with lesions not amenable to open resection. The minimally invasive nature of this technique, significantly reducing the collateral damage to the surrounding brain structures, suggests Its potential in the treatment of this bGBM \[14\] with significant implications as a deficit-sparing technique, particularly if associated with preoperative and intraoperative monitoring and mapping techniques. The SLITT-GBM study will combine unilateral open surgery for maximal tumour resection with contralateral LITT to the smaller component/residual.

Medical TV dramas have become very popular in recent years. These shows are mainly created for entertainment and often do not reflect what really happens in hospitals. However, television plays an important role in sharing information, shaping how people think, and teaching the public about medicine. Death and dying in hospitals, especially in Intensive Care Units (ICUs), are highly emotional experiences. In real life, these situations often turn out very differently from what patients and families expect. Because of this, it is important to understand how medical TV shows portray major hospital events such as end-of-life care, death, and the delivery of bad news. When what is shown on TV does not match the reality of ICU care, it can lead to unrealistic expectations, false hope, and greater distress for patients and their families at the end of life. At the same time, violence and aggression towards healthcare providers have increased in recent years. This can include verbal abuse as well as physical attacks. Looking at how healthcare workers are treated in medical TV shows may help us understand whether these programmes influence what behaviour is seen as acceptable. Since violence against healthcare staff has become especially concerning since the COVID-19 pandemic, the possible role of media should not be ignored, even though many factors are involved. This study aims to describe how death and dying are shown in popular medical TV series and to explore how violence or aggression towards healthcare providers is portrayed in these settings.

The goal of this study is to learn if a single session intervention for people with Functional Cognitive Disorder (FCD) is feasible and acceptable. The main questions it aims to answer are: What is the impact of a single session intervention on FCD symptoms, functional impairment, and quality of life in people with FCD? What is the feasibility and acceptability of piloting a single session intervention for people with FCD. Participants will: * Complete questionnaires about cognitive concerns, anxiety, depression, functional impairment and quality of life * Visit the clinic for a single session intervention including practicing the Attention Training Technique (ATT) * Complete 2 telephone calls with a researcher to discuss their use of the intervention and to complete the same questionnaires from their clinic visit, and a questionnaire about their experience of the study and intervention.

There are not enough donated livers for everybody who needs one, and as a result, thousands of patients worldwide are waiting for liver transplants, with many dying while waiting for a life-saving organ. One reason for this shortage is that some usable livers from donors who are considered of high risk are being thrown away out of concern that they might not work well after transplantation due to a problem called ischaemia reperfusion injury (IRI). The discarded organs are mostly those coming from donors who have died due to cardiac arrest (called 'donation after circulatory death' or DCD), with only 27% of them being used in the UK. The quality of these DCD organs could be improved by changing how they are preserved after being removed from the donor. The most commonly used strategy is still to remove the livers and put them in an icebox ('static cold storage' or SCS). The alternative approaches, which are more complex and expensive, but that can also improve the quality of the DCD livers, involve using machines to pump fluids through the livers ('machine perfusion' or MP). There are three MP methods being used in patients: 1) normothermic regional perfusion (NRP), which involves pumping the donor's blood through the liver after the donor has died but the liver is still in the donor's body; 2) normothermic machine perfusion (NMP), in which the liver is pumped with blood outside of the donor's body; and 3) hypothermic machine perfusion (HOPE), which is also used outside of the donor's body by pumping cold fluid into the liver. HOPE and NRP have been shown to improve how well DCD livers function after transplantation. NMP can also improve the quality of the DCD livers, but its main advantage is that it allows confirming that the donated liver functions well before proceeding with the transplant. Until now, there has not been a proper comparison of these methods, and the doctors do not understand well the mechanisms through which MP improves the quality of the DCD livers. The iInvestigators plan to conduct a study where 36 DCD human livers will be split into three groups: SCS, NRP, and HOPE. After that, they will be put in NMP to confirm that they are good enough to be transplanted and to study the mechanisms through which NRP, SCS and HOPE work.

This is a prospectively recruiting, database development study collecting images and videos of the spontaneous venous pulsation at the back of people's eyes - this is a pulse one can see on examination of the back of the eye, originating from the blood vessels around the nerve that connects the eye to the brain (the optic nerve), and is present in most people who have normal pressure around the brain. However, in people with raised pressure in the brain, this pulse disappears as the pressure rises. Many things can cause the pressure around the brain to increase, including tumours, swellings and trauma. The investigators want to test if high-quality images and videos of this pulse, taken using both hand-held and larger, fixed-platform machines, can be used to train a software tool to automatically detect this pulse. The investigators want to collect these images and videos in 2 groups of patients: those with no known or suspected brain pressure problems, and those who are suspected to have raised pressure and/or are due to undergo measurement of the pressure around the brain, called lumbar punctures or intracranial pressure bolt monitoring. These tests to check the pressure around the brain are invasive - they involve inserting needles in the back or directly into the brain to measure the pressure, and carry risks. The value of these two groups of people will be to help train the software to reasonably say whether a pulse is present or absent and, hopefully, estimate what the pressure around the brain may be without the need for an invasive test.

The purpose of the study is to investigate novel electroretinography (ERG) devices in the detection of hydroxychloroquine retinopathy. Two devices (the RETEval full-field and flicker ERG and UTAS multifocal ERG) will be evaluated in this study, comparing device outputs to standard of care screening tests, in groups of participants characterised by presence or absence of hydroxychloroquine-related retinopathy.

Currently, guidelines from the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists stipulate that all women who have sustained an obstetric anal sphincter injury in a previous pregnancy and who are symptomatic or have abnormal endoanal ultrasonography and/ or manometry should be counselled regarding the option of an elective Caesarean section. An abnormal endoanal ultrasonography is currently considered to be a defect of the external anal sphincter (EAS) of more than 30 degrees while an abnormal anorectal manometry would be an incremental squeeze pressure of less than 20mmHg. This study aims to evaluate if a course of guided pelvic floor exercises could improve anal sphincter function on those with suboptimal or abnormal anal incremental squeeze pressures, and subsequently expand their options for future modes of delivery (vaginal delivery not contraindicated)

Background: Some health conditions make breathing difficult and uncomfortable. When this happens every day, it is called chronic breathlessness. Over 3 million people living with heart and lung disease have chronic breathlessness in the UK. Breathlessness is very difficult for patients themselves and their families, resulting in disability and feelings of fear, distress, and isolation. Due a to lack of supportive breathlessness services many patients frequently attend hospital Accident and Emergency (A\&E) departments seeking help. Given the on-going challenges faced by the National Health Service (NHS) in the United Kingdom, such as long waiting times, staff shortages, increased demand for services because of the COVID-19 pandemic, there is an urgent need to develop new ways to support those living with chronic breathlessness. One potential solution is to offer support online, as it is estimated that in the UK, 7 out of every 10 people with chronic breathlessness are internet users. With the help of patients and NIHR funding the research team lead by Dr Charles Reilly, developed an online breathlessness supportive website called SELF-BREATHE. SELF-BREATHE provides information and self-management tools such as breathing exercises, that patients can do at home themselves. SELF-BREATHE has been tested as part of its development. SELF-BREATHE is acceptable and valued by patients. But what is unknown is whether SELF-BREATHE improves patients' breathlessness and their life? This is the question this research seeks to answer. Aims 1. To test if using SELF-BREATHE for six-weeks improves patients' breathlessness, their quality of life and whether SELF-BREATHE should be offered within the NHS 2. To see if patients opt to continue to use SELF-BREATHE after six-weeks and what benefits this may have for patients. Methods The research team are undertaking a randomised controlled trial. For this, 246 people living with chronic breathlessness will be recruited in to this study. Each person will be randomly chosen by a computer to continue with their usual care or their usual care plus access to SELF-BREATHE. All study participants will complete questionnaires at the start of the study, thereafter at seven and twelve weeks after randomisation. These questionnaires will ask patients about 1) their breathlessness and its effect on their life and 2) planned and unplanned hospital visits. At the end of the study, we will compare answers to these questionnaires between the two groups at seven and 12 weeks. This will tell if SELF-BREATHE improved patients' breathlessness and reduced their need for unplanned hospital visits e.g., A\&E attendances due to breathlessness.

Chronic cough (\>8 weeks in duration) affects 5-12% of the global population, and is associated with considerable health status impairment and comorbidities. Currently, there are validated severity and impact outcome measures whilst objective measures with cough frequency monitoring is not available in routine clinical practice. Unlike other chronic respiratory diseases, namely asthma, there are no validated dedicated tools to assess the control of cough as a disease. This study aims to develop a validated patient-focused tool to assess the control of cough, which may be useful to evaluate the benefit and value of treatments in both clinical and research settings.

Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a complication of traumatic haemorrhagic shock (THS) and together these conditions increase mortality risk. Although septic shock patients who develop severe AKI are known to develop hypoperfusion of the renal cortex, little is known regarding intra-renal perfusion changes in THS. The aim of the current study is to investigate the effects of THS on renal microcirculatory perfusion.

Acute kidney injury (AKI) is a common complication of septic shock and together these conditions carry a high mortality risk. In septic patients who develop severe AKI renal cortical perfusion is deficient despite normal macrovascular organ blood flow. This intra-renal perfusion abnormality may be amenable to pharmacological manipulation, which may offer mechanistic insight into the pathophysiology of septic AKI. The aim of the current study is to investigate the effects of vasopressin and angiotensin II on renal microcirculatory perfusion in a cohort of patients with septic shock.

Mechanical ventilation (MV) is life saving for infants requiring respiratory support in the newborn period but its use has been associated with complications. High frequency oscillation (HFO) is a type of MV that delivers small volumes of gas across the lungs at fast frequencies. HFO is a lung protective strategy but it has also been linked to brain injury due to low carbon dioxide tensions. High-frequency oscillation with volume-targeted ventilation (HFO\&VTV) is a new mode of HFO in which the clinician sets a target volume of gas to be delivered to the lungs at fast rates to decrease the lung injury related to the ventilator. Further, HFO\&VTV achieves better control of carbon dioxide levels and may therefore protect against brain injury. Currently, there are no written guidelines about the use of HFO\&VTV. This study aim to determine the safety profile of HFO\&VTV compared to HFO by comparing the velocity of blood flow to the brain in term born infants and the cardiac output in term and preterm infants during the two modes. The investigators will also determine the optimum starting value of the target tidal volume during HFOV\&VTV. Infants will be studied at three different target tidal volumes for a period of 10-20 minutes each. A cranial ultrasound (for term infants only) and bedside echocardiogram will be performed at the end of each period.

This study aims to test a new AI-powered portable MRI scanner that can quickly identify whether a brain scan is normal or abnormal. Currently, standard MRI scans are expensive and have long waiting times. Our goal is to see if a smaller, cheaper, and more accessible MRI scanner-combined with artificial intelligence (AI)-can help doctors identify abnormalities faster and improve patient care. We will invite patients from King's College Hospital (KCH) who are already having a standard MRI scan. They will be asked to have an extra scan using the portable MRI, which takes about 60 minutes. The AI tool will then analyse these scans and compare its results to those of expert radiologists. By the end of the study, we hope to prove whether portable MRI with AI can be used in hospitals and GP clinics, making brain scans more accessible, reducing wait times, and helping doctors prioritise urgent cases. This study is funded by the Medical Research Council (MRC) and has been approved by UK research ethics committees.

Stroke - still the second commonest cause of death and principal cause of adult neurological disability in the Western World - is characterised by rapid changes over time and marked variability in outcomes. A patient may improve or deteriorate over minutes, and the resultant disability may range from an obvious complete paralysis to subtle, task dependent incoordination of a single limb. Unlike many other neurological disorders, stroke can be exquisitely sensitive to prompt and intelligently tailored treatment, rewarding innovation in the delivery of care with real-world, tangible impact on patient outcomes. Optimal treatment therefore requires both detailed characterisation of the patient's clinical picture and its pattern of change over time. Arguably the most important aspect of the patient's clinical picture -- body movement -- remains remarkably poorly documented: quantified only subjectively and at infrequent intervals in the patient's clinical evolution. The combination of artificial intelligence with high-performance computing now enables automatic extraction of a patient's skeletal frame resolved down to major joints, like that of a stick-man, to be delivered simply, safely, and inexpensively, without the use of cumbersome body worn markers. Central to this technology is patient privacy, with the skeletal frame extracted in real time, ensuring no video data, from which patients can be identified, to be stored or transmitted by the device. Our motion categorisation system -- MoCat -- will be used to study the rapid dynamics of acute stroke, seamlessly embedded in the clinical stream. By quantifying the change in motor deficit over time we shall examine the relationship between these trajectories with clinical outcomes and develop predictive models that can support clinical management and optimise service delivery.

Focal cortical dysplasia (FCD) is a malformation of brain development, the most common cause of drug-resistant epilepsy and often caused by mutations in mammalian target of rapamycin (mTOR) pathway genes. Patients with FCD develop drug-resistant seizures. This study will look at FCD tissue removed during epilepsy surgery and aims to detect mutations in mTOR pathway genes in brain cells. Secondly, the investigators will establish if evidence of mutations found in brain cells can also be detected as circulating free DNA (cfDNA) in blood. By looking at which genes are made into proteins in individual cells found in epilepsy surgical tissue (single cell expression profiling),the investigators will attempt to identify new genetic targets in FCD. The main outcome will be finding new causes of epilepsy with FCD and the development of new diagnostic and screening tools.

Many premature infants require respiratory support in the newborn period. Mechanical ventilation although life-saving is linked to complications for the lungs and other organs and its duration should be kept to a minimum. The use of supplemental oxygen may also increase the risk of comorbidities such as retinopathy of prematurity. Therefore, oxygen saturation levels and the amount of inspired oxygen concentration provided should be continuously monitored. Oxygen control can be performed manually or with the use of a computer software incorporated into the ventilator that is called 'closed loop automated oxygen control'(CLAC). The software uses an algorithm that automatically adjusts the amount of inspired oxygen to maintain oxygen saturation levels in a target range. Evidence suggests that CLAC increases the time spent in the desired oxygen target range but there are no data to determine the effect on important clinical outcomes. A previous study has also demonstrated that CLAC reduces the inspired oxygen concentration more rapidly when compared to manual control. That could help infants come off the ventilator sooner. With this study we want to compare the time preterm infants spend on the ventilator when we use the software to automatically monitor their oxygen levels with those infants whose oxygen is adjusted manually by the clinical team. That could help us understand if the use of automated oxygen control reduces the duration of mechanical ventilation and subsequently the complications related to it.

ESCALATE will provide a thorough investigation of how anti-inflammatory therapy, with low-dose colchicine, affects patients with stable coronary artery disease. Using traditional clinical risk factors and multimodality intracoronary imaging, the investigators will identify patients with the greatest clinical risk. Participants will undergo repeat multimodality intracoronary imaging assessment at 6 months to measure the impact once-daily low-dose colchicine therapy on the structure and function of coronary arteries. This study will provide valuable insights into how anti-inflammatory therapies, such as colchicine, may improve outcomes in patients with coronary artery disease.