One of the highlights of the SUFU (Society of Urodynamics, Female Pelvic Medicine and Urogenital Reconstruction) annual meeting was the honouring of Prof. Christopher Chapple BSc, MD, DHC, FRCS with the organisation’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
The SUFU meeting was held in Phoenix, Arizona, United States February 24-28 2015. Prof. Chapple, longtime ICS member and outgoing editor of Neurourology and Urodynamics, is a consultant urologic surgeon at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals and Honorary Professor at Sheffield Hallam University. His primary research interest is functional reconstruction of the urinary tract.
Professor Chapple’s lecture was on the evolution of current treatments for stress urinary incontinence. Prof. Chapple began by expounding upon the concept of “functional urology” promoted by his mentor, Sir Richard Turner-Warwick. The lecture traced the development of treatments for stress incontinence to contemporary techniques. Prof. Chapple has been successfully utilising what he refers to as “a sling on a string” (autologous fascia pubovaginal sling) for 30 years but he explains there is still no ideal sling material to date. The lecture described his own research and others’ in the area of regenerative medicine and the use of muscle-derived stem cells to restore the integrity of the sphincter mechanism. This, he stated, shows the most promise for successful treatment of stress incontinence in the future. Professor Chapple concluded that the success of this technology will prove to be his lifetime achievement.
Article by Nina Davis on behalf of the Publications and Communications Committee.