Contact details

Name: Deena Harji

Job title: Consultant Colorectal Surgeon and Associate Professor

Location: University of Leeds and Manchester University Foundation Trust

Email: deena.harji@mft.nhs.uk

Specialities and research

Speciality

• General surgery

Sub-speciality

• Colorectal surgery

Research interests

Deena’s clinical and academic interests are advanced and recurrent colorectal malignancy, pelvic exenteration, and robotic and digital surgery.

She has an academic portfolio of over £6 million with her research centring on the evaluation of complex interventions and clinical trials methodology within surgery.

She has a growing interest in MedTech and surgical innovation, both from a clinical perspective, to improve patient outcomes, and an academic aspect to ensure robust evaluation and appropriate implementation.

Type of research

• Quality improvement projects
• IDEAL evaluation studies
• Mixed-methods studies
• RCTs

Clinical trial experience

Chief investigator

• Phase III randomised trial evaluating chemotherapy followed by pelvic reirradiation versus chemotherapy alone as pre-operative treatment for locally recurrent rectal cancer – This trial is funded by Bowel Research UK. Greccar-15 UK is the UK arm of an international trial, led by the French Greccar group, assessing different neoadjuvant treatments in locally recurrent rectal cancer across five expert centres in the UK. 
• A multicentre, randomised controlled trial of laparoscopic versus open colorectal emergency surgery – The LACES2 Trial – This is a multicentre, phase III, superiority RCT assessing the effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of laparoscopic versus open emergency colorectal resection. The LACES2 trial is funded by the NIHR HTA.

Co-investigator

• Laparoscopic versus Open Colorectal Emergency Surgery: The LACES Feasibility Study – LACES is a prospective, multicentre, single-blinded, parallel group, pragmatic randomised controlled feasibility trial of laparoscopic versus open emergency colorectal resection. This trial was funded by NIHR RfPB.

Principal investigator

• Real-world, in-situ, evaluation of the introduction and scale-up of robot-assisted surgical services in the NHS: evaluating its impact on clinical and service delivery, effectiveness and cost – This is a multicentre, stepped-wedge trial assessing the adoption and scaling of robotic-assisted surgery across all surgical specialities in the UK. This trial is funded by NIHR HS&DR.

Postgraduate supervision

Deena is currently a PhD/MD supervisor.

More information

• Research profile

Related