The US-based March of Dimes has presented its 2019 Agnes Higgins Award to University of Southampton Professor Caroline Fall, and long-standing collaborator Professor Chittaranjan S Yajnik, Director of the Diabetes Unit, King Edward Memorial Hospital, Pune, India.
Together, Professors Fall and Yajnik have worked closely as research partners for 30 years. Through the Agnes Higgins Award, they have been particularly recognised for their independent and collaborative contribution to our understanding of how a mother’s diet affects foetal development, which can impact a child’s health at birth and also increase the child’s risk of diabetes and cardiovascular disease in the future.
“Myself and Professor Yajnik have worked together as research partners for 30 years, so we have really achieved all this together. It has had an impact on policies to support maternal health and nutrition around the world” enthused Professor Fall who is Professor of International Pediatric Epidemiology in the University’s MRC Lifecourse Epidemiology Unit.
“Professor Yajnik has been an integral investigator on most of my research grants in that time, a frequent visitor to Southampton, and has hosted Southampton students and fellows in his department,” Professor Fall continued.
March of Dimes leads the fight for the health of all moms and babies, supporting research, leading programs and providing education and advocacy so that every baby can have the best possible start, built on a successful 80-year legacy of impact and innovation.
Read our full story here.
