An Irish doctor who volunteered to care for sick children on an Indian reservation in northern Ontario was the overall winner at the Irish Journal of Medical Science (IJMS) Doctor Awards last night.
Dr Marion Rowland received the main prize for research into the "Helicobacter pylori" organism in children which doctors believe is associated with gastric cancer.
Dr Rowland is a research assistant in the UCD department of paediatrics at Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children in Crumlin.
Her research team has obtained £350,000 over five years from the Wellcome trust to study the acquisition of H. pylori in childhood. This work is ongoing and formed the basis for her winning paper.
Educational bursaries totalling £34,000 were awarded last night in 15 categories to Irish doctors in recognition of their excellence in research.
Dr Rowland said she hoped her work on how children developed the bug and sometimes got reinfected would help to create ways to interrupt its spread.
"If its spread among children can be reduced, it is likely that the overall rates of the infection can be dramatically decreased, with a resultant major fall in cases of gastric cancer world-wide," she said.
In addition to working for a time on the Sioux reservation in Canada, Dr Rowland worked for more than two years as a medical officer in a 200-bed hospital in rural Nigeria.
She hopes more female doctors will consider returning after career breaks to work in medical re- search, especially clinical research.
"I think that many more women would be interested in this area of work except that they believe that their lack of prior experience precludes them from this opportunity. I think that they could greatly enhance clinical research in this country," she added.
A Lifetime Achievement Award was also presented to heart specialist, Prof Eoin O'Brien, a world expert on blood pressure.
A consultant at Beaumont Hospital, he cared for former taoiseach Charles J. Haughey during a recent life-threatening illness. He is an authority on the history of medicine and literature and has published a book on the writer Samuel Beckett.
Prof O'Brien has also been involved in international humanitarian affairs, writing extensively on the landmine crisis and has spoken on preventive diplomacy at the United Nations.
The IJMS Doctor Awards were open to all doctors who had a clinical research paper published in a medical journal between July 1999 and July 2001.
Presented by ╔ireann Healthcare Publications, the event was hosted in conjunction with the Health Research Board - this year's main sponsors.