Congratulations to Dr Stephen McNally, Ms Sarah Middleton and Ms Maria Stack

Congratulations to Dr Stephen McNally, Ms Sarah Middleton and Ms Maria Stack of the Clinical Measurement Research Group
The following three candidates have recently successfully defended their postgraduate theses:

Dr Stephen McNally PhD, for his work on respiratory muscle testing in Motor Neuron Disease (MND) patients. Although there is no cure for MND, Stephen's work adds to the understanding of the disease progression, and aids in the management of the patients.
Ms Sarah Middleton MPhil, for her work on evaluating the exposure of staff to noise and vibration in the workplace in a large multi-discipline organisation. This work is very topical with new EU legislation having just come into force.
Ms Maria Stack MPhil, for her evaluation of acoustic techniques in the screeing of patients suspected of having Sleep Aponea. There are large waiting lists for testing, and her screening approach can help reduce waiting lists.

All three students were part of the clinical measurement research group, supervised by Drs Pat Goodman, James Walsh and Matt Hussey.

IJMS Doctor Award for DIT Researchers

An Irish Journal of Medical Science (IJMS) Doctor Award has been presented to Marie McCaffrey, a postgraduate student of Dr Pat Goodman of the School of Physics. The awards are presented for excellence in medical research, and are awarded for a medical related research publication within the previous 12 months. There are a number of categories of award, 12 in total, and Marie's was for the best research paper in the Irish Journal of Medical Science in 2006.

The awards ceremony took place in the Four Seasons Hotel on January 31st, and the presentations were made by Ms Mary Harney TD, Minister for Health. The winning research paper by McCaffrey, Goodman, Clancy and Kelleher was on staffing levels, customer occupancy and smoking levels in a selection of Dublin pubs, pre and post the workplace smoking ban.

See Irish Journal of Medical Science