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The Sophie Cameron Performing Arts Centre
The official opening of The Sophie Cameron Performing Arts
Centre took place on Tuesday 3rd May 2011 at the Royal High
School Bath. Guests enjoyed drinks and supper before being
entertained by the comedy, The Tamworth Two, written by James
Graham-Brown, the former Head of the Royal High School. The
occasion provided an opportunity to celebrate Sophie’s life as
well as the achievements of The Sophie Cameron Trust over the
last ten years. Supporters of the Trust and members of the
school community were welcomed by the school’s present Head,
Becky Dougall, as well as James Graham-Brown, who paid tribute
to Sophie and to the work of the Trust. Richard Wharton, the
Trust Chairman, also spoke and a memorial plaque was presented
to the school by Lydia Cameron, Sophie’s sister. The evening was
a fitting commemoration to the sense of community that inspired
the establishment of the Sophie Cameron Trust, a small charity
that has accomplished so much, as is detailed elsewhere on this
site.
Professor Vilensky’s book on EL, “Encephalitis
Lethargica: During and After the Epidemic”, is published
Professor Joel Vilensky’s book, dedicated to Sophie Cameron and
with a Prologue by
SCT, as well as a preface by Dr Oliver Sacks, was published
by Oxford University Press in New York at the end of 2010.
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SCT Encephalitis lethargica surveillance and
research at BICMS/QMUL: 2010 update
The EL surveillance program was set up in 2007, with the support
of the Sophie Cameron Trust. The aim of this is to monitor all
reported UK cases of EL, and to gain specific information on
these cases. There are two arms to this study; the paediatric
surveillance programme commenced in December 2007, and the adult
surveillance programme commenced in April 2008.
As of October 2010, we have been informed of 13 confirmed EL
cases in the UK, 9 of these were paediatric cases. Many of these
are still awaiting informed consent and have not yet been
entered on the database; in several cases informed consent has
not been obtained and it has not been possible to obtain further
observation. The number of confirmed cases is low, and the
number of cases reported via the surveillance program included a
number of retrospective cases; however, the initial diagnosis
and reporting of EL cases (and therefore the number of cases
reported) depends on the awareness of the condition.
A research programme to investigate the functional significance
of ABGAs has been supported by a grant from the Sophie Cameron
Trust. This currently supports the PhD project of Priya Dua,
which started in October 2008. The main focus of Priya’s work is
to establish a working model to study encephalitis lethargica as
well as related post-streptococcal movement disorders. In
particular this tests the role of streptococcal infections and
the functional significance of anti-neuronal antibodies studied
in the previous project. A
progress report is attached.
David Holden & Priya Dua
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Previous News Items:
1. Some thoughts on Joel Vilensky’s upcoming book
about encephalitis lethargica.
2. SCT Encephalitis
lethargica surveillance and research programme: update
3. Seminar by
Professor Vilensky
4. SCT Encephalitis lethargica
surveillance and research programme at BICMS/QMUL: 2009 update
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