Liverpool hosted the International Academy for Oral Oncology conference in July 2025, welcoming over 1000 delegates from around the world IAOO | International Academy of Oral Oncology. Our research group hosted the pre-congress 15th International Quality of Life in HNC meeting, with presentations from group collaborators Dr Andy Levy ‘Patient and staff behaviour change to support HNC interventions’ and Professor Adrian Midgely ‘Exercise principles and challenges in HNC’. Our strategic board member, Professor Kate Hutcheson presented on ‘Implementation of prehabilitation in HNC’. Dr Gemma Cherry gave a short paper on ‘Exploring the needs fo Adult Carers supporting a family member or friend with HNC who are >75 years’

During the main meeting, there was plenty of sessions focusing on function and QOL to choose from. Our Doctoral Fellows gave some outstanding presentations: Alison Smith ‘Custom-made patient specific nasal devices for speech and swallow rehabilitation in patients with velo-pharyngeal insufficiency’ Taran Malhotra ‘Real-world challenges and solutions in virtual surgical planning’ and Linda Cantwell ‘Optimising holistic care in Dietetics’. Dr Roganie Govender, honorary member of our group, moderated a session on functional outcomes.

Professor Jo Patterson was an invited speaker at the Australian New Zealand Head and Neck Cancer Conference 2025, held in Adelaide.

The theme of the meeting was “Shaping the Future of Head and Neck Cancer Treatment”. Jo gave six presentations, covering topics on prehabilitation, shared decision-making, transoral surgery functional outcomes and the future of survivorship care. The meeting was a great opportunity to connect with our established collaborators, as well as forging new networks.

The 2026 meeting  will be in Brisbane, joined with the IFHNOS 8th World Congress, where members of our team plan to present their work IFHNOS 2026 - Australia and New Zealand Head and Neck Cancer Society

Dr Sousie Papadopoulou, Associate Professor in the Department of Speech and Language Therapy, University of Ioannina Greece joined us for two months to gain more research experience. She joined our research project groups working on peer support models for head and neck cancer patients, rating measurements for respiratory-swallow cycles for people with swallowing difficulties and helped our PhD Fellows with their co-design workshops. Sousie also had the opportunity to join School of AHP and Nursing’s Pedagogy Research Group meeting. She is returning to Greece, with fond memories of her time spent with us, cementing our continued research collaboration.