16 October 2018
Dr Sonya Babu-Narayan, consultant cardiologist at the Trust and clinical senior lecturer at Imperial College London, has been appointed the Associate Medical Director for the British Heart Foundation (BHF).
Dr Babu-Narayan is internationally recognised for her research to improve the care and quality of life of adults who were born with heart defects (adults with congenital heart disease) and already holds a BHF Intermediate Clinical Research Fellowship for research.
The British Heart Foundation is the UK’s largest funder of heart and circulatory disease research and Dr Babu-Narayan’s role as Associate Medical Director will involve providing leadership and strategic direction to the research mission of the BHF.
She will work alongside the existing Associate Medical Directors, Professor Jeremy Pearson and Professor Metin Avkiran. She will also continue her clinical and research activity at Royal Brompton Hospital and Imperial College London.
Dr Jenny Rivers, the associate director for research at the Trust, said; “We are extremely pleased that Sonya has been recognised for her ability to make a unique contribution to the future direction of BHF’s research. BHF is a fantastic organisation which supports a great deal of our research across the Trust. Sonya’s research is instrumental in our quest to further knowledge of and improve lives of patients with congenital heart disease, and has been supported by the RBHT Charity alongside her BHF Fellowship, allowing her to make the most of this prestigious funding in driving forward her research ambitions.”
Dr Sonya Babu-Narayan said: “It’s a real honour to be joining the BHF. I know how the charity is trusted and valued by the heart and circulatory disease research community, as well as patients and their families’ who are at the very centre of everything we do.”
“This is an exciting time to be taking on this new challenge; there’s a growing need to foster national and global collaboration to generate world-class cardiovascular research, new technologies, particularly data processing and artificial intelligence, are helping us to think in new ways, and we’re seeing more and more cases where patients have more than one long-term condition, which increases the complexity of both treatment and research.”
Professor Sir Nilesh Samani, Medical Director of the BHF, said: “We’re absolutely delighted to have appointed such a talented individual who is absolutely passionate about our mission. Sonya brings years of clinical experience, and a wealth of research knowledge.”
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