The 2nd Annual Dr Jill Gandy Memorial Lecture for Advances in Neonatal Medicine features talks on technology and networking opportunities.

This event will be hybrid and is free to attend, to register please visit: https://drjillgandyneonatal2022.eventbrite.co.uk

The Dr Jill Gandy Distinguished Memorial Lecture for Advances in Neonatal Medicine was established to commemorate the life and work of Dr Jill Gandy, in particular her pioneering work in the field of Neonatology during her working life at Mill Road and Rosie Hospitals.

The first annual conference was hosted in 2019. This year, we are delighted to be able to organise the second annual conference, to take place on Tuesday 18th October 2022.

This year’s talks will be centred around the theme of ‘Technological Innovations in Neonatology’. Our keynote speakers will be Professor Neena Modi and Professor Don Sharkey.

Other talks will be presented by a variety of speakers, both from the University of Cambridge and elsewhere. There will be networking opportunities for those attending in person over the lunch break and towards the end of the day. As well as the presentation of research posters from trainees. There will be a prize given for the best poster.

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Gillian Gandy (“Jill”) was one of the early pioneers of neonatal intensive care in the UK and a retired paediatric consultant at the Rosie maternity hospital. Dr Gandy trained at the Royal Free Hospital between 1946 and 1953, and after working in London hospitals spent a year in Ontario in 1958. This was followed by five years in New York, at the Babies Hospital there, and at Columbia University as a research fellow in neonatology.

She came to Cambridge in 1964, and in the 60s and 70s she was at the forefront of improving the survival rate of very premature babies, through her work in ventilation and understanding babies’ patterns of respiration. Dr Gandy was in charge of the Special Care Baby Unit in the mid-1960s, when there were only four incubators, and she was instrumental in helping to set up the Premature Baby Unit in the original Rosie maternity hospital.

In recognition of her achievements, she was made an honorary lifetime member of the British Association of Perinatal Medicine, for her “important and seminal contributions to the development of neonatal care”.

A friend and fellow doctor, Jill Donnelly, said: “She was the single main reason my own tiny premature baby, born in 1980 and only just 1kg at 32 weeks, not only survived the traumatic first few weeks of life, but did so in a way that has allowed him to be awaiting suitable consultant appointment in North Yorkshire, as a fully trained Paediatrician.”

Jane Cursiter, Dr Gandy’s partner for 18 years, said: “In her own words, taken from her retirement speech: ‘What I have enjoyed most is the teamwork, and the gradual evolution of neonatology into a much more human specialty.’ I was very lucky, and very proud, to know her.”