ACF Programme Details
Manchester University
Last updated: 7th October 2015
2015 entry level – ST2 or ST3
This Academic Clinical Fellow (ACF) post in Manchester is the first endeavour of its kind. It has been established to provide support for junior trainees in histopathology who have outstanding potential for development as a researcher and/or educationalist. This is a locally funded post with NIHR approval.
The post holder will enter the Health Education North West (North West) Histopathology training programme, at the appropriate point according to their experience (ST2 or ST3).
The Department of Cellular Pathology at Manchester Royal Infirmary comprises Cytopathology, Adult Histopathology, Adult Mortuary, Paediatric Histopathology and Paediatric Mortuary. Adult Histopathology is delivered by The Department of Histopathology (total floor space 784m2) at Manchester Royal Infirmary which is located on two floors of Clinical Science Building (CSB 1) and includes purpose built, well equipped laboratories and a mortuary which also functions as a public mortuary for the City of Manchester.
Cryostat sectioning, immunohistochemistry with four Ventana immunostainers and facilities for handling bone and hard tissues are located in the main laboratory on the first floor of the department. The first floor also contains a reporting room for reporting and teaching, equipped with multi-headed microscopes and digital dictation facilities. The adjoining trainees’ room has a comprehensive range of textbooks. Category 3 facilities are available in the nearby Cytology department, if required.
The Adult Mortuary is located on the ground floor CSB 1. It comprises a body store, dissection room with four tables, gallery viewing area, relatives viewing area and office facilities. The ground floor of the Adult Histopathology department houses a large electron microscopy unit with two JEOL electron microscopes (one new). Part of the ground floor also houses the ST1 Histopathology Training School and is the venue for both undergraduate teaching and clinico-pathological/multi-disciplinary team meetings. Microscopy and videoconferencing facilities are available within the teaching area.
There are close links with the Manchester Cytology Centre and the University of Manchester through the School of Biomedicine.
The Histopathology Department currently is fully accredited with CPA (UK).
The Department of Histopathology receives approximately 25,000 patient requests per annum. This body of work includes specimens generated both at Central Manchester and Trafford hospital sites and their respective pathology service-linked general practices. A further increase in workload followed in spring 2014 due to reconfiguration of regional hepato-pancreatico-biliary surgical oncology services.
Currently, there are sub-specialist teams reporting in renal & urological pathology (Drs Denley and McWilliam), endocrine pathology (Drs Denley, McWilliam and Thiryayi), gynaecological pathology (Drs Wilson, McVey, Fitzmaurice, Howarth, Wright and Thiryayi), gastrointestinal and liver pathology (Prof McMahon, Drs Benbow, Wright, Howarth and McGrath), head and neck pathology (Dr Hall and Prof Thakker), dermatopathology (Dr Hall), osteoarticular and soft tissue pathology (Prof Freemont and Dr Hall), ophthalmic pathology (Drs Bonshek and Irion), cardiopulmonary pathology (Drs McGrath and Thiryayi) and lymphoreticular pathology (Drs Byers and Irion). Team reporting is organised on a weekly cycle with one or more consultants timetabled each week for individual specialities.
The department has a contract with the City of Manchester to store and, if necessary, at the order of HM Coroner for Manchester, allow the conduct of a post mortem examination for cases of death occurring within the community. More than 1000 adult post mortems are carried out annually. The adult department is not responsible for paediatric post mortems, which are performed at the separate Paediatric Mortuary, also found on the central site. Coronial autopsies are conducted outwith the NHS contract, although post mortem based teaching activity is currently recognised within Job Plans. The autopsy service is currently provided by Prof McMahon and Drs Benbow, Fitzmaurice, Howarth, McWilliam, McGrath, Byers and Mazhari. The current rota arrangement is based on a daily cycle with one to two leads per day. The Coroner will accept new pathologists onto the list of “approved” pathologists at the written request of the Clinical Lead accompanied by a statement of the individual’s qualifications and experience.
The ACF will be expected to participate in the surgical and cytology rota and will report cases under supervision. This includes participation in the surgical cut-up. There is also a rota for post mortems. Participation in the postgraduate training programme is mandatory as is attendance at black box meetings.
There are excellent opportunities for postgraduate teaching and education, which is encouraged. These include post mortem teaching, ‘Black box’ meetings, small group teaching for departmental trainees and participation in the locally administered FRCPath course hosted at The Christie. The department also regularly accepts medical undergraduates for clinical placements and participates in the provision of problem based learning group supervision.
Academic training
The University of Manchester (UoM) is a research intensive university ranked 33rd in the world in 2013, and third for research power in the UK in the most recent (2008) RAE. It provides, through the Faculty of Medical and Human Sciences and the Faculty of Life Sciences, an enormous range of research opportunities across the entire range of biomedicine and the ACF will therefore be able to conduct research in any area of particular interest; it is not possible therefore to detail these in this application.
The Manchester Academic Health Science Centre was renewed in 2013. It is one of only 5 Academic Health Science Centre in the country and represents collaboration between UoM and the academic acute Trusts in Greater Manchester (Central Manchester, Salford, South Manchester and The Christie), together with the Manchester Mental Health team. The MAHSC research themes are cancer, mental illness, inflammation and repair, human development, including maternal and fetal health, cardiovascular disease, population health, and e-Health, and as such provide a very wide range of translational research opportunities linked to clinical units. In particular the areas of musculoskeletal disease, cardiovascular, neuroscience and cancer research are nationally leading and are well placed to provide translational research in tissue pathology, having a strong track record of histopathological involvement in their research programmes.
Whilst formal ACFs have not previously been established these research opportunities have been used by trainee histopathologists extensively in the past, either as OOPs leading to publication or higher degrees or less intensively but resulting in conference presentations and publication. This underscores the strength and appropriateness of the research environment for translational and molecular pathology research. In order to help the ACF select a research area and project Dr Byers will act as mentor and facilitator for contact with research leaders in the UoM, and particularly with the MAHSC themes, though it is recognised that some ACFs may wish to pursue more basic research in the Faculty of Life Sciences, and this will also be supported. Many of the research themes and groups are based on the central university site, proximity of which to the clinical base hospital, Central Manchester, will facilitate working between the research and clinical blocks. Generic research training, including research ethics and GLP, will be provided and the ACF will be expected to undertake the MRes in Medical Sciences, though it is recognised that some ACFs may already hold higher degrees and would therefore be exempted. Details of laboratory work and the methods used will obviously depend on the project but the specific skills in terms of tissue analysis the ACF can bring to the projects will be emphasised.
The University expects academic clinical fellows to take advantage of further training opportunities, particularly with regard to developing their professional competence in teaching and research methodology. New academic registrars are, expected to register for the Certificate in Health Research and after discussion to progress to take the diploma if appropriate. If they wish they can undertake the full MSc/MRes.
Research
In Histopathology the early training years are dominated by learning and training and not service delivery. Therefore it has been agreed that the 3 months research time will not require any backfill to ensure service delivery. This would ensure that research time is protected. Research time will account for 25% of the training time and can be provided flexibly but will for most ACFs be most effectively delivered as blocks of 3 months off clinical rota in each academic year. This will enable significant work to be undertaken without distraction. The 3 month blocks will be flexible in timing between years but it is envisaged that they will be spaced to enable sufficient lengths of clinical training between research blocks. It is also envisaged that the ACF will remain involved in the research team they are working with during the 9 month clinical blocks. This will enable the research undertaken at the start of the academic year to continue with technical support and facilitate preparation of abstracts and publications during non-protected research time, maximising outputs and training.
The Faculties of FLS and MHS have very extensive research programmes. In MHS these are in the areas of the Research Institutes, namely Brain, Behaviour and Mental Health, Cancer Sciences, Cardiavascular Sciences, Human Development, Inflammation and Repair, and Population Health, and in FLS they are in 13 thematic Research Groups covering all aspects of biology, detailed at http://www.ls.manchester.ac.uk/research/researchgroups/. Further details for the research themes in MHS can be found at http://www.mhs.manchester.ac.uk/about-us/structure/facultyinstitutes/.
Pathology is represented in the PBL modules of the MBChB course and pathology teaching is delivered the second, fourth and fifth years of the Undergraduate Course in Medicine as well as the intercalated BSc, and dental course. The post holder will be required to take an active role in the delivery and development of undergraduate and postgraduate medical education and will be expected to act as PBL tutor.
Training Programme Director - Dr. Lipsita Patnaik dr.patnaik@bfwhospitals.nhs.uk
Academic lead - Dr. Richard Byers richard.byers@cmft.nhs.uk
Recruitment Helpdesk: Helpdesk.Recruitment@pat.nhs.uk or 0161 604 5553
Applicants wishing to find out more about the relevant clinical training programme(s), should go to the Specialties Schools page and click on the link(s) for the relevant clinical training programme(s).
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