Golden Hour

We are the only site in Europe to analyse ultra-early biomarkers from patients who have suffered from Traumatic Brain Injuries (TBI) and severe major trauma. We work closely with our pre-hospital teams to take blood and saliva samples from patients within 1 hour of their injury so most samples are taken before the patient even arrives in hospital! These samples are then analysed by scientists in our partner organisation, the University of Birmingham, who look at markers of inflammation and changes in DNA. The outcome of this learning is to be able to identify people who will be at risk of a poor outcome further down the line and also to develop roadside or bedside tests which can diagnose conditions like concussion very quickly. This will then improve the treatments we can give and also patient outcome maybe even years into the future.