Many people know that low dose aspirin helps protect against heart attack and stroke but few realise that an Irish medical researcher discovered why and helped make the treatment safer. That same researcher, Prof Garret FitzGerald of the University of Pennsylvania, who won the 2005 Boyle Medal for Scientific Excellence, comes to Dublin later this month to deliver a free public lecture about his work, writes Dick Ahlstrom
The Boyle medal laureate has been asked to give the lecture in order to help promote a better public understanding of science, an aim of the medal's sponsors, the Royal Dublin Society and The Irish Times. It falls to the laureate to choose a subject and title for the lecture.
Prof FitzGerald, a Dublin-born clinical pharmacologist, heads his university's institute for translational medicine and therapeutics and is chairman of the department of pharmacology. The title of his talk is Hope, Humility and Hubris: From Aspirin to Vioxx and Beyond.
In it he will talk about the most widely used pain-killing drugs in the world and the effects these drugs have on us, both good and ill. Aspirin can help protect the heart by thinning the blood but poses a risk to the stomach, where too much can trigger ulcers.
FitzGerald's work in this area helped flag the hidden risks associated with taking low-dose aspirin in cases where the patient was also taking the world's most popular pain relievers for arthritis sufferers, including Vioxx.
Vioxx and related drugs moved onto the market very quickly, earning huge profits - about €8 billion a year - for the companies that produced them. The drugs were approved too quickly, however, on the basis of small, short-term studies, something that FitzGerald warned about years before these drugs were shown to pose a risk.
FitzGerald had a central role in the scientific discoveries that explained all of this. It is a clear illustration of how Irish researchers make a major contribution to world science.
It is for this reason that the Boyle medal - first awarded in 1899 after its introduction by the RDS and now awarded every other year - alternately celebrates the work of a scientist based in Ireland and an Irish-born scientist based abroad.
To book your place at the lecture call 1550-114706 or 0906-6040246 (from Northern Ireland), leaving your name and telephone number and the number of seats you require (maximum four seats per person). Calls cost 95 cent per minute and calls from mobile phones may be more expensive.
The phone lines will remain open until the lecture is fully booked. Tickets are not available directly from either The Irish Times or the Royal Dublin Society.