Family day at QI’s Heritage Open Day

On Saturday 14 September, the Quadram Institute is welcoming everyone to visit for its first Open Day. The day includes our endoscopy and research facilities which are based in the Quadram building.

From 10am to 3pm, the free event will let you discover the hidden worlds of health, food and microbes.

The event is part of the nationwide Heritage Open Days, and this year marks the 60th anniversary of food research in Norwich. It is also the fifth anniversary of the former Institute of Food Research and the NNUH coming together in the Quadram Institute building.

Tracy Mcdonnell, Lead Nurse for Endoscopy Service, said: “We are looking forward to opening our doors to the public at the endoscopy department and being part of the Heritage day.

“They will have the opportunity to look round our state-of-the-art facilities along with having a go at scoping on a training model for both upper and lower endoscopy procedures.

“There will be experienced and knowledgeable staff available throughout the day to speak about the bowel cancer screening programme and also endoscopy and related problems.”

The open day is a unique chance to look inside our endoscopy centre, one of the largest in Europe. See the equipment used to look down inside your gut and meet some of the team running the endoscopy and bowel screening service. You can even try your hand at scoping on one of our simulators.

You will have the opportunity for guided tours around the NNUH Clinical Research Facility. This is our primary facility for all clinical trials that do not need to be located in the main hospital building, with out-patient clinical and laboratory space as well as a food preparation area for diet-related studies. NHS research staff will run stalls to introduce you to the world of clinical trials and how this research translates into ways to keep us healthy.

The open day will look back at how research in Norwich has helped boost the UK’s health and supplied us with safe, nutritious food, as well as looking at our current research in the microbiome and gut health, some of the clinical research projects underway and coming soon, and how this integrates with our endoscopy service for patients and screening.

 

There will be hands-on activities for all the family to enjoy and explore the microbial world – turn pathogen detective to identify bugs that make us ill, work out how best to treat infections or have a go at coding a Raspberry Pi and use AI to banish bad bugs.

You’ll also find out how you can take part in current and future research trials into food, diet and health.

Complete a sticker trail around the activities and you may even take home a prize.

• There will be free parking on the day in the Quadram Institute car park, adjacent to the Quadram building – please note other car parks will charge a fee.