DOCTOR Peter Wark, son of Delma and John Wark of Tea Gardens, is actively involved in medical research on asthma at the John Hunter Hospital, and has recently been presented with, for the second time, the Hunter Medical Research Institute (HMRI) Early Career Medical Researcher of the Year.
The HMRI Awards for 2005/2006 were held on November 9, at Newcastle City Hall.
These annual awards recognise HMRI researchers for making discoveries that benefit humanity.
This year at the awards, HMRI awarded over $300,000 to local researchers in projects as diverse as the health and well being of victims of trauma, childhood cancer, premature birth and schizophrenia.
Currently residing in Newcastle, 37 year old Dr Wark is a descendant of the Motum family, (one of the first families to settle in the area), and many of his close relatives still live locally.
His mother, Delma, went to school in the district, as did her own mother.
Having previously been living in England for the past three and a half years, Dr Wark was working on his research at the South Hampton Hospital in the UK, but returned to Australia a year ago and is now based at John Hunter Hospital in the Department of Respiratory Medicine.
Dr Wark has travelled the world lecturing on his medical findings on asthma, having visited America, England, Scotland and Spain.
Before venturing overseas, Dr Wark was a Captain in the Army Reserve for approximately three years, following in the footsteps of his grandfather and great grandfather, who also served in the armed forces.
Dr Wark graduated from the University of Newcastle with a Bachelor of Medicine in 1991 and a Doctor of Philosophy in 2001.
He was then awarded a Neil Hamilton Fairley Research Fellowship by the National Health and Medical Research Council of Australia to enable him to work in South Hampton, one of the best research hospitals in the UK.
John and Delma are extremely proud of their son and what he has achieved, discovering a cellular defect that could set off virus-induced asthma.
Virus induced asthma attacks are the most common reason adults and children with asthma are admitted to the emergency departments of our hospitals, which is a huge health and economic burden to our country.
With help from his colleagues in the Hunter and Britain, Dr Wark found that the cells from people suffering from asthma were more susceptible to a common cold than the cells from a non-asthma sufferer.
His discovery was significant as asthma can easily be controlled with medication, but if the sufferer got a cold, they seemed to lose control of their asthma.
"Treatment of asthma is usually not effective when someone develops a cold.
"Their puffers don't work as well and they may need stronger forms of treatment," explained Dr Wark.
"Now this defect has been uncovered, we can look at potential new forms of treatments to specifically target acute virus asthma," he continued.
This will undoubtedly lead to new and better treatments for what is a major problem for the Australian community.
As well as his recent award at the HMRI annual awards night, Dr Wark also received a research award in 2004, The AstraZeneca Fellowship in Medical Research, which included a $17,000 research grant.
Additionally, he was presented with the first Ethel and Olive Hewitt Scholarship for the research on asthma, from the Hunter Medical Research Foundation, as well as securing an IL Thompson Research Fellowship, ($10,000).
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