Maternité Prize of the European Association of Perinatal Medicine

Prof. Christian P. Speer, MD, FRCPE

Prof. Christian P. Speer, MD, FRCPE is Chairman and Director of the University Children’s Hospital in Würzburg, Germany. He received his MD degree at the University of Göttingen, and completed postgraduate training in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Göttingen in Germany. He completed a research fellowship at the National Jewish Hospital and Research Center with Prof. Richard B. Johnston, Jr. in Denver, Colorado, USA in 1982–83, and subsequently held appointments at the University of Göttingen (Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Neonatology) and became Professor of Pediatrics and Director of the Department Neonatology, University Children’s Hospital Tübingen in 1994. In 1996 he was elected as a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians (Edinburgh), and in 1999 he became Chairman and Director of the University Children’s Hospital in Würzburg.

Christian Speer’s main areas of research interest include host defense mechanisms in neonates, early detection of neonatal systemic infections, clinical surfactant trials, basic surfactant research and inflammatory mechanisms in acute and chronic lung diseases of preterm infants. Christian Speer’s scientific career took a new direction in 1986 when Prof. Bengt Robertson, Karolinska Hospital, Stockholm, a pioneer in basic and clinical surfactant research, invited him to take part as a collaborator in the first European randomized multicenter trial evaluating a porcine surfactant preparation in preterm infants with respiratory distress syndrome (RDS) [1] [2]. He immediately accepted this exciting invitation to join an initiative that led to a major discovery in neonatal medicine, one that to date has saved the lives of more than a million of preterm infants worldwide. Prof. Tore Curstedt, a clinical biochemist also working at the Karolinska Institute, had developed this natural surfactant preparation [3] and Prof. Henry L. Halliday, a neonatologist from Queen’s University Belfast [4], was the clinical coordinator of the first trial and many subsequent trials. These 3 key people in surfactant research trials, soon became very close friends with Christian Speer and suggested that he should organize and conduct the second randomized European multicenter trial which demonstrated a further improvement in outcome of high risk preterm neonates [5]. Since these early trials, a large number of randomized clinical trials with the porcine surfactant preparation, poractant alfa, have helped to optimize the strategy of surfactant treatment. Christian Speer takes an active role in the scientific organization of the annual Workshops on Surfactant Replacement which will celebrate their 30^th anniversary next year in Stockholm.

Christian Speer’s second area of interest is clinical translational research and he is very well-known for his publications on inflammatory mechanisms of acute and chronic lung diseases of preterm infants. His research group was one of the first to systematically describe a sequence of inflammatory events in the airways of preterm infants with bronchopulmonary dysplasia (BPD) which helped to understand the pathogenesis of this chronic and debilitating disease of preterm infants [6]. These findings which have since been confirmed by numerous investigators have opened the way to define specific targets for effective prevention and treatment of BPD.

Christian Speer has published more than 300 ­scientific articles in international and national journals and is author of many book chapters on acute and chronic pulmonary diseases in neonates. In addition, he has edited the textbook “Pädiatrie”, Speer CP, Gahr M (Ed): Springer-Verlag Berlin, Heidelberg, New York, 4^th edition 2013, and has been reviewer for many international scientific journals. Christian Speer has served and is still serving on the editorial boards for various international journals.

He has been an invited speaker at numerous congresses and symposia in Europe, North and South America, Asia, Australia, the Middle East and Africa. In addition, he has served as secretary of the “Working Group on Neonatology” within the “European Society of Pediatric Research” (ESPR), and as board member of the “European Association of Perinatal Medicine” (EAPM). In 2004 he was the “Geoffrey Thorburn Visiting Professor” of the “Perinatal Society of Australia and New Zealand (PSANZ)” and in 2005 he was invited by the Hong Kong Pediatric Society to give the “James Hutchison’s Memorial Lecture in 2005”. In addition, he received the “Chiesi Award for Excellence in Neonatology in 2006” at the biannual scientific meeting of the EAPM. From 2010–2012 he served as President of the EAPM. In 2013 Prof. Speer was elected as a Honorary Member of the American Pediatric Society for his major and internationally recognized contributions to pediatrics, and he became an Honorary Member of the Russian Perinatal Society. In 2014 he was awarded the “Maternité Prize of the European Association of Perinatal Medicine” at its biannual scientific meeting in Florence.

Together with Prof. H.L. Halliday, Belfast he is editor-in-chief of Neonatology, formerly Biology of the Neonate, and co-editor of the Zeitschrift für Geburtshilfe und Neonatologie.

Since 1996 he has regularly organized the international symposium, Recent Advances in Neonatal Medicine, which has become the largest scientific and educational forum dealing with neonatal medicine outside the United States of America.

Despite his great workload and great clinical responsibility, Christian Speer is not only an extraordinarily engaging and empathetic neonatologist and pediatrician but also an outstanding academic teacher and scientist in the field of neonatal medicine. His many international friends appreciate his clear structured, friendly and humorous personality and congratulate him cordially together with the board members of the EAPM for his award of the Maternité Prize in 2014.

• References

• 1 Halliday HL, Speer CP. Bengt Robertson: a surfactant pioneer. Biol Neonate 2002; 82: 272-273
• 2 Collaborative European Multicenter Study Group . Surfactant replacement therapy in severe neonatal respiratory distress syndrome: an international randomized clinical trial. Pediatrics 1988; 82: 683-691
• 3 Speer CP, Halliday HL. Tore Curstedt – the basic science creator of porcine surfactant. Neonatology 2014; 106 in press
• 4 Robertson B, Speer CP. Henry L Halliday – master of evidence-based neonatology. Biol Neonate 2005; 88: 246-247
• 5 Speer CP, Robertson B, Curstedt T et al. Randomized European multicenter trial of surfactant replacement therapy for severe neonatal respiratory distress syndrome: single versus multiple doses of Curosurf. Pediatrics 1992; 89: 13-20
• 6 Groneck P, Götze-Speer B, Oppermann M et al. Association of pulmonary inflammation and increased microvascular permeability during the development of bronchopulmonary dysplasia: a sequential analysis of inflammatory mediators in respiratory fluids of high risk preterm infants. Pediatrics 1994; 93: 712-718