University of Ulster Forensic and Legal Medicine MSc student, Dr Peter Rowan, has been awarded the Royal Society of Medicine and Faculty of Forensic and Legal Medicine postgraduate research prize for his innovative research into new methods of forensic digital imaging.
Dr Rowan, a general practitioner and forensic medical examiner in East Anglia, UK undertook a distance learning forensic medicine research project with supervisors Dr Tara Moore and Dr Edward Goodall. The research investigated a new method of imaging bruises to obtain evidence for suspected cases of child abuse, rape and domestic violence.
He developed a method to image bruises successfully and to record evidence of bruising on victims which is effective even when there is a significant period of time between reporting of bruises and the date of incident, and importantly when all bruising is invisible to the naked eye.
This is the second consecutive year that a University of Ulster Forensic and Legal Medicine student has been awarded this research prize at the event at The Royal Society of Medicine in London.
Last year Dr Winnie Maguire, a forensic medical officer from Belfast was awarded the same prize for her research with Drs Moore and Goodall on injuries related to sexual assault in Northern Ireland.
Supervisor Dr Tara Moore said: “The award of this prize for Pete’s research this year is clear recognition of the calibre and dedication of the student and the course team for the Forensic and Legal Medicine course at University of Ulster. We are extremely fortunate to have such experienced forensic medical officers from Northern Ireland willing to dedicate their time to students like Pete who have such enthusiasm to undertake this three year course and complete a MSc while also working as GPs and FMOs.”
Joint supervisor Dr Edward Goodall commented “Pete has wanted to undertake research in this area of forensic imaging since he first started this course three years ago and I am delighted that his hard work and effort has been recognised in this way by the Royal College of Physicians, Faculty of Forensic and Legal Medicine.”
The manuscript resulting from this project has been accepted for publication in the Journal of Forensic and Legal Medicine. The next step in this research is to develop and validate this new digital imaging system as a recognised method to capture watertight evidence that can be used in court. An additional contributor to this research was the internationally renowned forensic pathologist, Professor Austin Gresham of Cambridge University, who recently passed away. The authors would like to acknowledge the valuable guidance and support provided by Professor Gresham during this study.