Doctor honoured for baby brain-cooling cap

An Auckland professor has been awarded a medal for using a cooling cap that induces mild hypothermia to treat and prevent brain injuries in newborn babies.

Alistair Gunn was awarded the MacDiarmid Medal on Wednesday for his research into the use of brain cooling on babies who experience low oxygen at birth.

Using his research, the University of Auckland professor of paediatrics and physiology developed a "cooling cap", a mild hypothermia treatment to reduce brain injury in newborns.

Dr Gunn's ongoing experimental studies are credited with providing the foundation for understanding how, when and for which babies, the cooling cap can successfully reduce brain damage.

Based on those results, he went on to develop and lead a major international trial involving 25 perinatal centres and 234 babies in New Zealand, the US, Canada and the UK.

This trial demonstrated cooling could improve survival among babies and prevent disability in all but the most severely affected babies.

Follow-ups with the children at age seven and eight confirmed these results, which were supported by subsequent trials carried out by others around the world.

Therapeutic hypothermia is now the global standard of care for treating babies with brain injury caused by low oxygen level.

"Naturally I am delighted and honoured with this award," said Dr Gunn.

"We can now say in retrospect, after all these trials, that the benefits are real and highly consistent."

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Doctor honoured for baby brain-cooling cap