One of the country’s leading neurosurgeons has joined the Trust to boost both its clinical and research strength.
Mr Antonio Belli joins UHB from Southampton General Hospital, where he became the first surgeon in Britain to implant a ceramic plate into a patient’s skull, using 3D modelling technology to create the plate.
Mr Belli said he was delighted to be joining the Trust to help develop the neurosurgical capacity and expand research activity: “The new hospital is well known around the country and has a very good reputation, and it is always interesting to work in such a new hospital.
“The hospital is very important for the West Midlands and does high quality neurosurgical work; I’m looking forward to being part of that to help patients here.
Mr Belli specialises in neurotrauma and pituitary surgery.
As well as his clinical role, Mr Belli will play an important part in expanding the Trust’s research activity. He has been appointed as Reader in Neurosurgery by the University of Birmingham and will be heavily involved in the NIHR Surgical Reconstruction and Microbiology Research Centre, which was set up in 2011 to help the NHS benefit from lessons learned from treating military trauma patients.
“The strong partnership with the University of Birmingham means that research into new treatments is central to the work we do, and that was one of the big attractions of moving to Birmingham to work at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital.”
His research interest is in neurobiochemistry and neuromonitoring of acute brain injury. Working with cerebral microdialysis, he has focused on early markers of tissue damage and on the prevention of secondary injury after trauma and subarachnoid haemorrhage.
Mr Belli is the principal or chief investigator of several acute brain injury studies, including an international drug trial for the treatment of traumatic brain injury which has opened at UHB.
Mr Belli graduated from Tor Vergata University in Rome in 1992 with a degree in Medicine and Surgery. He completed a doctoral degree (MD) on neurobiochemistry of brain ischaemia and reperfusion at Tor Vergata University and then moved to the UK in 1994.
He trained as a neurosurgeon at King’s College Hospital, Atkinson Morley’s Hospital, The National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, Great Ormond Street Hospital, The Royal Free Hospital and Charing Cross Hospital.
Mr Belli is on the editorial board several neurology journals and is an advisor to NICE and the Care Quality Commission.
To read more about Tony Belli visit his team profile.
