A University Hospital Southampton consultant paediatrician has been given a royal seal of approval this week after receiving her MBE from Princess Anne.
Katrina Cathie works in clinical paediatrics and paediatric research in Southampton Children’s Hospital, specialising in children with secondary epilepsy and helping to dramatically improve the service offered to our young patients.
In her paediatric research time, Katrina has focused on vaccine studies in children - ward based studies including early phase antibiotic research and taking part in large national portfolio studies.
But for the past two years Katrina’s efforts have also been focussed on helping in the fight against COVID, having initially volunteered to be redeployed from her research role to cover clinical shifts in paediatric and short-stay units.
She has helped spearhead the Covid vaccine study, led by Southampton in collaboration with colleagues in Oxford, supporting medical and research staff and helping to recruit hundreds of participants to the trials.
Katrina, who is chair of the National Institute for Health Research Clinical Research Network general paediatric group, has also been the lead principal investigator locally for the Janssen Covid-19 vaccine trial.