Clinical

• The underpinning philosophy of the FASTER programme is the application of research to clinical practical and the link between the academic and research portfolio with the centre of clinical excellence is fundamental.

  The majority of the FASTER team traverse the boundary between the University of Leeds and the Leeds Teaching Hospital NHS Trust with Heidi Siddle and Begonya Alcacer-Pitarch holding substantive posts, and Jill halstead and Michael Backhouse holding honorary posts with both organisations.

  The FASTER programme has contributed to the development of a Leeds assessment and treatment model published formally in a number of books and captured in the ARMA and NICE clinical guidelines.

  Among the initives that mark the Leeds clinical/academic interface as a centre of excellence are:

1. Integration of foot health services in to the day to day activities of rheumatology outpatients.
2. Development of stratified foot health clinics catering to the specific needs of different patient groups.
3. A joint rheumatology/foot health ultrasound teaching clinic, providing clinical training to the registrars and making specialist expertise available to patients.
4. A combined foot health/rheumatology/orthopaedics surgical assessment clinic enabling multidisciplinary assessment and surgical referral decision making.
5. Contribution of clinical trials and other research activity to enhanced patient care - these include the NIHR funded CARROT pragmatic trial of podiatry care in RA and PISCES an arc funded multicentre clinical trial in scleroderma.

• Recognition of the clinical impact of these initiatives has been forthcoming through formal awards and prizes.

  2007 - Winner, National Rheumatoid Arthritis Society, Patient in Focus large unit award. Davys, Helliwell, Redmond and Emery. Foot Health Provision for Rheumatology Patients: the Leeds Clinical Model.

  2004 - Hospital Doctor National Award, Academic Unit of the Year Finalists.