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McKnight Brain Institute of UF - International Alliances

University of Messina, Italy

Prompted initially by the leadership of Dr. Ronald Hayes in his role as the Director of the CTBIS to expand its access to foreign scientists and clinical research subjects, the McKnight Brain Institute of UF has recently embarked on a plan to establish a series of international alliances with individual universities and governmental agencies from foreign countries where they may be beneficial in helping the MBI-UF to accomplish its research, education or service activities. The first of these to be pursued formally is with the University of Messina in Italy. This choice was prompted by the fact that Dr. Hayes has enjoyed a long history of successful research and training interactions with their neurosurgery faculty, residents and research fellows interested in traumatic brain injury research. Toward that end a formal cooperative program has been proposed during visits from various members of their faculty to the MBI-UF including the dean of the University of Messina College of Medicine, Dr. Francesco Tomasello, who also happens to be the chair of the Department of Neurological Surgery. A return visit by Drs. Luttge, Anderson and Berns is planned for February 2002.

The initial goals of this international alliance include the following:

1. Training of neurosurgical residents from the University of Messina in the UF Department of Neurological Surgery. We anticipate regular visits by residents from the Department of Neurosurgery at the University of Messina for periods of six months to one year. These resident "research fellows" would have the opportunity to observe contemporary procedures in the practice of neurosurgery at our institution and where appropriate, participate in classroom and instructional opportunities such as cadaveric dissection protocols. In addition, we would make efforts to provide opportunities to contribute to various research protocols ongoing in the Department of Neurological Surgery and/or the Department of Neuroscience.
2. The facilitation of exchanges of faculty. We understand that the Italian government is interested in providing opportunities for faculty from UF to visit Italy in order to promote development of regional neuroscience programs. We have endorsed this opportunity and will cooperate in identifying and providing faculty with expertise in programmatic areas you would like to see developed. More precise identification of these areas could be discussed at a later date.
3. The establishment of multi-national clinical research initiatives that could include:
   1. epidemiological studies of central nervous system (CNS) disease and/or injury;
   2. multi-center analyses of factors influencing outcome from acute CNS insults and development of appropriate surrogate/biochemical markers of injury;
   3. conduct of international multi-center clinical trials. Many of these efforts could be facilitated by web-based technology resident at the University of Florida Clinical Trials Research Center.

4. The facilitation of laboratory collaborations. We understand that the University of Messina and other laboratories in Italy have an established history of productive laboratory research in brain injury and disease. Drs. Hayes and Anderson are already involved in jointly conducted laboratory investigations. We would support efforts to further expand these collaborations in a variety of areas of interest to investigators at both institutions.

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