Professor Eric Morand: The curse of steroids in Lupus - and a way forward. Find out more on 30 Sep 2015

Professor Eric Morand is Head of the School of Clinical Sciences at Monash Health, Monash University. He is a Professor of Medicine and Rheumatic Diseases, research group leader in the Monash Centre for Inflammatory Diseases, the Director of Rheumatology at Monash Health and Founder of the Lupus Clinic at Monash Health. Professor Morand will be speaking at the forthcoming 30 Sept Translational Research symposium hosted by Central Clinical School. See detail below.

Trained as a specialist physician in rheumatology in Australia and at the Royal National Hospital for Rheumatic Diseases UK, Professor Morand has led the rheumatic diseases group of the Monash Centre for Inflammatory Diseases since the mid 1990s. He has held Program and Project grants from NH&MRC, NIH, and Royal Australasian College of Physicians, and served on the Council of the Australian Rheumatology Assocation and chaired its Scientific Program and Research Committee. He has published over 120 peer-reviewed publications, book chapters and patents. The main focus of his research has been the actions of glucocorticoid-regulated proteins in inflammatory processes relevant to rheumatoid arthritis and systemic lupus erythematosus.

Professor Morand founded the Monash Lupus Clinic in 2006. This is Australia's only multidisciplinary clinic focussed on SLE, and hosts the Monash Lupus database, Australia's largest longitudinal collection of clinical data and matching serum/DNA bank. In 2012 he became the Director of Rheumatology at Monash Health.

Professor Morand is Head of the School of Clinical Sciences at Monash Health, now the largest site for clinical teaching in Australia's largest medical degree. Prior to becoming Head of School in 2011, Eric chaired the Clinical Skills Theme of the Monash MBBS degree and served as Year III MBBS coordinator at Southern Clinical School.

Prof Morand will be speaking at the Central Clinical School's Translational Research Symposium Wednesday, 30 September 2015, on the topic of "The curse of steroids in Lupus - and a way forward".

All welcome, see details:

• Time: 8.00 am registration for 9.00 am start. Drinks and canapes from 6-8 pm
• Venue: AMREP Lecture Theatre, adjacent to the BakerIDI Institute at 85 Commercial Road, Melbourne 3004, 200 metres east of the main Alfred Hospital entrance. See map.
• Cost: Free
• RSVP by Friday 25 September for catering purposes
• Enquiries: Catherine.Wong@monash.edu ph +61 3 9903 0640

Breakthrough opens door to safer lupus drugs

Fabienne Mackay's group. Lead author Dr Will Figgett seated
far left with Prof Fabienne Mackay next to him.

A ground-breaking discovery by Monash University researchers could revolutionise treatments given to lupus sufferers, saving thousands of people each year from serious illness or death caused by secondary infections.

Lupus is a vicious and widespread autoimmune disease that can attack any part of the body. It affects one in 1,000 Australians and 5 million people worldwide, and its victims are typically young women. Indigenous and Asian people suffer higher rates than other groups.

Current treatments for lupus essentially ‘switch off’ the patient’s immune system to stop it attacking their body, according to lead researcher Dr Will Figgett, from Monash University's Department of Immunology.

Low vitamin D levels linked to lupus

            Dr Kristy Yap

Monash-led research has shown for the first time that low vitamin D levels are associated with higher disease activity in Australian systematic lupus erythematosus (SLE) patients.

Published earlier this month in Lupus Science & Medicine, lead researcher Dr Kristy Yap, MBBS from the Centre for Inflammatory Diseases in the School of Clinical Sciences reported her findings in the first study to examine SLE disease in the Southern Hemisphere.