Lifetime Achievement Award for Professor Solomon Tesfaye
Professor Solomon Tesfaye, a Consultant Physician/Diabetologist at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Honorary Professor of Diabetic Medicine at the University of Sheffield, has been presented with an international Lifetime Achievement Award in recognition of his outstanding diabetes research spanning several decades.
The Award was given to him at the 34th NeuroDiab annual meeting and celebrates his significant achievements in advancing understanding of diabetic neuropathy, a major complication of diabetes.
Professor Tesfaye is the first person from the UK to win the prestigious accolade since 2008 when it was awarded to his role model and mentor Professor John Ward, who developed diabetes services in Sheffield.
Diabetic nerve damage is a painful but often forgotten complication of diabetes that causes numbness and an inability to perceive pain. Up to half can be affected by the serious condition, which puts them at risk of infection, inadvertent injuries, and amputations.
A pioneer in his field, Professor Tesfaye’s work has led to the advancement of new treatments and improved lives in the UK and beyond. Advised by Professor Ward to focus on one or two studies that have impact, in the 1990s he was the first to show what blood flow in the sural nerve (a purely sensory nerve in the back of the lower leg) looks like, demonstrating that it was impaired in those with diabetes-related nerve pain. His description is now used in textbooks across the world.
A landmark New England Journal of Medicine paper, published in 2005, identified for the first time that nerve damage in people with diabetes is associated with other risk factors such as smoking, obesity, high blood pressure and high cholesterol and not just blood sugars, paving the way for the development of new treatments.
He also pioneered the use of electrical spinal-cord stimulation, a treatment used to relieve chronic pain in those with persistent diabetic neuropathy who have not responded to other treatments and convened the Toronto Diabetic Neuropathy Consensus Panel. This has since been cited 4,000 times and provides an international consensus on how diabetic neuropathy is managed, treated, diagnosed, and described. Another key breakthrough showed that diabetes-related nerve damage involves the spinal cord in the brain and not just the peripheral nerves in the legs.
More recent work has led to the establishment of an award-winning Sheffield One-Stop Diabetes Screening Service enabling people with diabetes to access all nine of their recommended diabetes health checks at the same time. As well as avoiding the need for multiple GP visits, the service has unmasked previously undiagnosed painful diabetic neuropathy in a quarter of attendees and highlighted the need for early detection in preventing devastating amputations.
A new groundbreaking study, called Oceanic, is also using smart technologies to see if intensive lifestyle interventions can reverse the lifetime risks of nerve damage in people with type 2 diabetes.
Gordon Sloan, who trained under Solomon and works at the Academic Directorate of Diabetes and Endocrinology, also won the Young Investigator Award.
Professor Solomon Tesfaye, Consultant Physician/Diabetologist at Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and a National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) Senior Investigator, said:
“I am hugely honoured to have won this award which really puts Sheffield on the map for its neuropathy research. This award is not only the result of personal effort but a testament to the combined effort of the whole unit. For me, few things come higher than knowing my achievements sit alongside the likes of Professor John Ward who was a huge role model for me. The strength and future of diabetic neuropathy research in Sheffield remains very bright, with Dr Gordon Sloan picking up the Young Investigator of the Year award at the same meeting, a title also bestowed to Dr Dinesh Selvarajah in previous years.”
Professor Waljit Dhillo, Dean of NIHR Academy said:
“Congratulations to Professor Tesfaye on receiving this award for his outstanding contribution to diabetes research. His work is a perfect example of when research plays a crucial role in improving the health and wealth of the nation. I was delighted to see Solomon appointed as an NIHR Senior Investigator this year and look forward to working with him over the next four years.”
ENDS
Photos:
- Professor Solomon Tesfaye receives his award at the 34th NeuroDiab annual meeting
- Professor Solomon Tesfaye (third from right) with the Sheffield diabetes team including Dr Dinesh Selvarajah (Previous Young Investigator of the Year) and Dr Gordon Sloan (2024 Young Investigator of the Year winner)
Go back
