Eye Health
Excellence and Distinctiveness
Ophthalmology research at Queen's University Belfast has a long-standing international reputation which has been built around high quality basic science, patient studies and clinical trials.
Work focuses on understanding and treating sight-threatening retinal diseases such as diabetic retinopathy (DR), age-related macular degeneration (AMD) and glaucoma.
Over the last 15 years, Ophthalmology research at Queen’s has been tackling the current and growing national and global challenges posed by these diseases.
The Queen’s ophthalmology programme holds a distinctive and important position in UK eye research, its success underpinned by the combined effect of basic scientists and clinicians who are focused on the same retinal diseases and through multidisciplinary teamwork drive innovation and impact. Our investigator profile consists of academic ophthalmologists, optometrists, surgeons, pharmacists, nutritionists, physicists and NHS consultants who work closely together to advance understanding of retinal disease.
The Ophthalmology Programme at Queen’s
The success of the ophthalmic programme at Queen’s has led to an impressive record of innovation and associated academic citations driven by grant income of more than £20 million over the last 5 years from sources such as MRC, Wellcome Trust, NIH, EU-H2020, and charitable organisations.
Queen’s is the most successful institution in the UK for ophthalmic trials and our clinical academics currently lead nine studies which will directly impact on NICE decision-making and NHS practice. These government-funded studies sit alongside commercialisation partnerships spanning the laboratory and clinical research areas and these have involved big pharma (Roche, Novartis, NovoNordisk), biotech companies and the creation of spin-out companies.
Beyond the eye-specific area, the inter-disciplinary nature of the ophthalmology programme is underlined by active collaborations that enhance research across the university in;
- Nutrition
- Cardiovascular disease
- Dementia
- Multiple sclerosis
- Imaging technology
- Health economics
- Machine learning
- Informatics
The excellence of the ophthalmology programme has brought several endowed professorships into Queen’s, including the recent award of the Ulverscroft Chair of Global Eye Health. A notable, landmark success for QUB was the award of a Wellcome-Wolfson Capital Award for “Translational Vision Science” which initiated the formation of the £32M state-of-the-art Wellcome-Wolfson Institute for Experimental Medicine with ophthalmology and diabetic microvascular disease as twin pillars of excellence. Academics in the ophthalmology arena have also brought significant reputational credit to Queen’s by being recipients of international awards, prizes, keynote lectures, editorial positions and hosts for large conferences such as the International Society for Eye Research (ISER 2018) and the European Association for the Study of Diabetes-Eye Complications (EASDec 2018).