I'm raising money for the Royal Free Neurosurgery Research and Development Fund, mainly to finance clinical research into brain tumours and pituitary tumours. The fund also supports staff training and developement within the Department of Neurosurgery at the Royal Free Hospital.

As a Consultant Neurosurgeon at the Royal Free Hospital I have developed a programme of research in these fields with 2 full time research fellows (PhD students) in post. The brain tumour research is aimed at defining tumour/brain boundaries better in order to maximise safe removal, through the use of special ultrasound techniques. This work is in collaboration with the Physics division of the Royal Marsden hospital.The pituitary research stems from my surgical specialisation in this field and is aimed at culturing and immortalising pituitary adenomas in the lab in order to study their genetic derangements and response to treatment, jointly with the Department of Endocrinology at the Royal Free.

Each year I run the London Marathon to raise funds for this work. The money goes towards research disposables, special equipment and education, not salaries (the fellows are doctors who pay their way by doing on-call duties).

Thank you for taking an interest and I hope you are able to support this work with a donation.

Best wishes,

Neil