Investigators
CRC Chairs
A/Prof Shannon Simpson, Prof Diane Gray (University of Cape Town, South Africa)
Project description
PELICAN (Prematurity’s Effects on the Lungs in Children and Adults Network) was launched by the European Respiratory Society in 2020. We are a Clinical Research Collaboration led from Perth but with members from 28 countries around the world.
Thanks to advances in medical care, more babies born early (preterm) are surviving than ever before. However, many of these children and adults still face long-term lung health problems which require medical care. PELICAN aims to better understand these issues and improve lifelong lung health for all people born prematurely.
Specifically, we will:
- Establish a research network of clinicians, researchers and community partners. Interested parties are welcome to join the PELICAN General Assembly here.
- To establish a harmonised data repository of preterm cohort data from around the globe
- To establish standardised and well-defined outcome measures for describing prematurity effects on lung health and make recommendation for harmonising elements of cross-sectional and longitudinal studies
- To assess life-long lung function trajectories and respiratory symptom profiles for survivors of preterm birth
- To evaluate the impact of temporal and regional clinical practice, treatments, and lifetime exposures on lung health trajectories in this population
- To promote clinician and community education to improve lung health outcomes for those born preterm
- To provide an invaluable and long-lasting resource for future generations of clinicians and researchers, in order to answer important questions regarding the lung health of survivors of preterm birth
Funders of the project
PELICAN has received funding from the European Respiratory Society (ERS) as a Clinical Research Collaboration and from the Government of Western Australia.
External collaborators
The PELICAN Scientific Steering Committee also consists of:
- Amber Bates, TinySparks WA, Australia
- Enrico Lombardi, Meyer Children’s Hospital, Florence, Italy
- James Gibbons, The Kids Research Institute Australia & Perth Children’s Hospital, Australia
- Thomas Halvorsen, Haukeland University Hospital, Bergen, Norway
- John Hurst, University College London, UK
- Lex Doyle, University of Melbourne, Australia
- Maria Vollsaeter, Haukeland University Hospital, Bergen, Norway
- Petra Um Bergstrom, Sachs' Children and Youth Hospital, Stockholm, Sweden
- Sailesh Kotecha, Cardiff University, Wales, UK
- Sanja Stanojevic, Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada