A SCIENTIST whose lifetime’s work to create a pill to treat a devastating condition is backing a fundraising run.

Professor Dame Kay Davies is urging people to sign up to the Oxford Mail-backed Town and Gown run in Oxford city centre on Sunday, May 11.

The 10k run raises money for the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign, which funds her work.

The genetic muscle-wasting condition, which affects boys, spreads to the legs and arms, and sufferers can die in their 20s after their respiratory muscles fail.

For more than 30 years Prof Davies, from Oxford University’s Department of Physiology Anatomy and Genetics, has been working on a potential treatment and it has now gone into early clinical trials with Summit PLC, an Abingdon-based drug company.

Prof Davies is working on a way to substitute the vital muscle protein lacking in the muscles of children with Duchenne muscular dystrophy and Becker muscular dystrophy, called dystrophin, with another muscle protein, utrophin.

Prof Davies, 63, said: “At the moment it is being tested on its safety and if it is safe then it could be tested in a small number of boys.

“Boys are affected because it is on the X chromosome and girls have XX which compensates. It won’t cure the condition. But if we are able to get this into children young enough it will prevent the rapid progression and greatly increase the quality of life for those boys.”

The substitute would take the form of a tablet taken orally.

The Department of Health announced a fast-track scheme for medicines for serious health conditions recently, and the campaign is hopeful that Prof Davies’ work could benefit from the scheme.

Prof Davies has run the Town and Gown in the past, but now cheers colleagues on.

She said: “Now that I am a bit older I get my group to do it. We need to raise awareness. The race is not just about raising money but also the awareness.

“It is so important that families are aware of the work we are doing because we need them to participate in the trial.”

The run is in its 33rd year, starting and finishing in Parks Road, Oxford.

This year, more than 2,000 have already signed up and it is hoped 4,000 runners will tackle the course next month.

Organisers hope to raise a record-breaking £150,000.

For information and to enter, visit townandgown10k.com

A multi-disciplinary approach

The Department of Clinical Neurology at Oxford’s John Radcliffe Hospital was recognised in 2012 as a “Centre for Research and Clinical Excellence” into Muscular Dystrophy by the campaign.

The campaign funds the work at the hospital, one of three in the country, to provide a multi-disciplinary approach to support those affected by muscular dystrophy and other related conditions.

It offers clinics for people across the country, training for clinicians, clinical trial co-ordinators and clinical research fellowships.