Alumni newsletter - May 2025

Huge congratulations to our Clinical Champions!

Our alumni community is thriving!

We’re thrilled to announce that Clinical Champion Leann McLaughlin (cohort 2) won gold at the recent British Journal of Nursing awards for Continence and Urology Nurse of the Year.

Also, Helen Casson (new cohort 5) and Clinical Champion alum Maria Innes (cohort 3) came second for Sustainability Nurse of the Year at the same awards for their self-removal of catheter work at the Royal Surrey NHS Foundation Trust. This piece of work was originally delivered by Wissam Abou-Chedid (cohort 2) as part of his Clinical Champions project.
Professor Nikhil Vasdev (cohort 1) has also been accepted as a member of the prestigious EAU Section of Urological Imaging. Congratulations.
We’d also like to thank all 15 Clinical Champions who took part in our Clinical March the Month team. From accidental half marathons and fencing to walking with dogs and family, our fantastic Champions pledged to get active and undertook the 11,000 steps a day challenge. Thank you for all your support!

Can testosterone therapy be a viable option for men suffering with the effects from hypogonadism due to prostate cancer treatment?

With the introduction of more effective treatments and longer life expectancy, there is a need to evaluate how we can improve the quality of life of those treated for prostate cancer.

Testosterone deficiency is a common issue amongst men who undergo prostate cancer treatment. It can result in loss of sexual desire, erectile dysfunction, fatigue, and more. In the past, the clinical community were concerned that the use of testosterone therapy could increase a man’s risk of prostate cancer recurrence. However, evidence suggests that testosterone therapy (TTh) is beneficial for certain groups of men.

International guidelines affirm that testosterone therapy may be offered to symptomatic hypogonadal (low/no testosterone levels) men who are disease free following low risk prostate cancer. Whilst these guidelines indicate a more positive outlook on TTh use, there is still an unmet need for more research on the use of TTh for men treated for prostate cancer. If more research supports the safety and efficacy of TTh, this treatment has the potential to greatly improve men’s quality of life. 

Check out the full paper here!

The impact of our Sexual Wellbeing Programme

Over the last 8 months, we’ve been working with clinicians in both primary and secondary care to improve their sexual wellbeing services for men undergoing prostate cancer treatment. As part of this programme, we had two of our Specialist Nurses join us and share information on the variety of supportive treatments and some helpful tips on how to begin conversations and answer questions with men and their loved ones.

The feedback we received from this programme:

• 100% of our feedback stated that attendees spoke more frequently with men about sexual wellbeing,
• 100% said they felt they were developing their professional skillset, feeling more equipped to drive change within their Trust, and
• More than 6,000 men across the UK will now be encouraged to talk about sexual wellbeing with a clinician.

Educational Conference success

Our recent educational conference was a huge success with nearly 200 in the virtual audience. We were delighted to be joined by Wissam Abou-Chedid and Maria Innes who presented an engaging session: ‘Empowering patients through the self-removal of urinary catheters: lessons from practice’.

The session covered the full development of this initiative, from idea to implementation, with a core focus on patient experience, education and recovery. You can rewatch this session and the others through the education platform.

Enormous thanks and well done to Maria and Wissam for their thorough, clear and engaging presentation! And to new Clinical Champion John Lunas, who brought his research in evaluating the self-removal initiative at UCLH and shared his expertise with the audience through the Q and A session.

Later this year, the team will be looking for sites keen to implement this change. Please contact the improvement team email for more information.