Bahira Shahim, researcher and cardiologist at Karolinska Institutet and Karolinska University Hospital, has been awarded the annual SEK six million Prince Daniel's Grant for Promising Young Researchers by the Swedish Heart-Lung Foundation. Her work has the potential to change the way of treating a common heart valve disease, which can cause sudden cardiac death and heart failure.
Prince Daniel's Grant for Promising Young Researchers is one of the Swedish Heart-Lung Foundation's most prestigious awards. It is given to researchers whose innovative work has the potential to improve the care of patients with cardiovascular diseases.
This year, the grant of SEK six million over three years has been awarded to researcher and cardiologist Bahira Shahim , docent at Karolinska Institutet's Department of Medicine in Solna and Karolinska University Hospital.
"The grant confirms for me that the research line my team and I are pursuing is important and has great potential to affect the research field and ultimately help patients," she says.
Dr Shahim studies mitral valve prolapse, a common disease in which the valve fails to seal properly, causing a leak that sometimes requires surgery to put right. Some patients suffer complications such as heart failure and life-threatening arrhythmia, which carries the risk of sudden cardiac death.
Unknown pathogenesis
Although the disease is well-known, the underlying causes remain uncertain.
"We know that mitral valve prolapse can cause serious problems, but there's no firm guidance on when and how to operate to minimise the risks," she says.
Dr Shahim's research combines advanced cardiac MR, rhythm monitoring and genetic analyses of heart tissue in order to determine the pathological process with the aim of understanding the relationship between valve disease and rhythm disorders and, ultimately, developing tailored treatments.
Personalised precision medicine next
Prins Daniel's Grant makes it possible for Dr Shahim and her team to scale up their research and include more surgical centres in Sweden in one large clinical study.
"This we need to do to be able to test new hypotheses and take the next step towards personalised precision medicine," she explains, adding that the recognition will now be celebrated with cake and bubbly at their research division.
Prins Daniel's Grant for Promising Young Researchers
The Swedish Heart-Lung Foundation seeks to promote the supply of young research talent by awarding a grant to particularly promising young researchers.
The purpose of the research grant is to help finance pioneering Swedish heart and lung research, with the aim to create conditions for decisive breakthroughs in an important field of great significance to patients.
It is awarded annually by the Foundation's honorary chairperson HRH Prince Daniel and is worth SEK six million divided over three years.
Source: The Swedish Heart-Lung Foundation
