Imperial medical student scoops prize for work in Hepatitis B diagnostics

Mario Lepore (left) with colleagues from the Medical Research Council Unit in The Gambia.

Fifth year medical student wins the Dr Falk Pharma/Core Medical Student Essay Prize 2015.

We are delighted to congratulate fifth year medical student, Mario Lepore who recently scooped this year’s £1,000 prize for the Dr Falk Pharma/Core Medical Student Essay 2015.  The Dr Falk Pharma/Core Awards are now in their eighth year and are dedicated to encouraging research and promoting patient care in diseases of the gut and liver.

As part of Mario’s intercalated BSc in Medical Sciences with Gastroenterology and Hepatolgy, he was given the opportunity to undertake a project at the Medical Research Council Unit in The Gambia.

The Hepatitis B virus (HBV) causes life-long infection in over 350 million people worldwide, with some of the highest rates observed in sub-Saharan Africa. It is a major cause of death, and in West Africa, it is the leading cause in young men.

It is important to measure the amount of virus present in an infected person’s blood, as it helps determine the necessity of treatment. This is currently performed in The Gambia using conventional blood tests and proves to be both expensive and time consuming.

The aim of Mario’s study was to investigate the use of Dried Blood Spots (DBS) as an alternative method of blood collection for HBV diagnosis. This involves acquiring blood drops via finger-prick and dropping them onto a filter paper card. There are no energy or laboratory requirements at the point of collection, saving both time and money. This is the first study of its kind to validate the use of DBS for this purpose within West Africa. The method shows promise as a means to improve access to HBV viral load monitoring, hopefully leading to an improvement in healthcare for a greater proportion of the Gambian population (and for the developing world in general).

Mario’s award will be officially presented to him at the Dr Falk Pharma/Core award ceremony in June this year.