January Message from the Medical & Research Director

January Message from the Medical & Research Director

I want to wish you all a healthy 2021. Everyone has had enough of the COVID-19 pandemic by now, after all it is ’21, but we must hold strong for the next 3-6 months.

After that I hope we will genuinely be starting to see COVID-19 in the rear-window. Heart disease and stroke have also gone nowhere, and, unfortunately, I believe the future will bring a surge in these conditions as an indirect result of COVID-19. Thus, our work at NIPC continues apace. One important NIPC update is that we hope to present results from our virtual/remote interdisciplinary lifestyle and risk factor programme, called MySlainte, in the near future. The potential for alignment between the MySlainte programme and impending plans for preventive cardiology in the community under the Slaintecare initiative is very exciting to me.

A second update includes plans for expanding the NIPC team to deal with the increasing volume of work coming into the institute. As always, we continue to develop and offer fantastic educational offerings, including an NIPC webinar of international speakers on Feb 11 on Women Heart Matters and our rolling ECG workshops. Related to these, I remind you to consider our world-class MSc in Preventive Cardiology, with applications open soon for the ’21-’22 academic year.

-Bill