Committing half-a-million pounds to support MND clinical trials across UK on Doddie’s 54th birthday

We have today, on what would have been Doddie's 54th birthday, announced we will invest more than £500,000 in clinical trials to help speed up the search for effective treatments, and one day a cure, for MND.

The funding will be allocated through our Clinical Research Infrastructure Awards, and is part of the our Catalysing a Cure research strategy which launched last year, The awards will support multiple centres across the UK to deliver MND trials by funding the time of clinical staff. 

When Doddie was first diagnosed in 2016 and subsequently set up My Name'5 Doddie Foundation, there was a severe lack of clinical trials in the UK. To date, we have already invested more than £3 million in UK trial centres to help them recruit the staff they need to deliver MND clinical trials – including support for the delivery of MND-SMART and TRICALS studies. We have also provided funding to enable MND trial delivery in Newcastle, leading to further recruitment to several national and local clinical trials.

Dr Tim Williams, consultant neurologist at the Newcastle Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, said: “The support we have received in Newcastle has been absolutely fundamental to a sea change in MND trial conduct and activity in Newcastle. It's been a great thing and I only hope such support continues and might reasonably be rolled out elsewhere. I think this is a highly effective and tangible use of funds.”

Jessica Lee, our Director of Research, said: “When Doddie was diagnosed in 2016, there were few MND clinical trials running in the UK. Since then, there has been significant progress and an increased investment into UK MND trials. It means today, the landscape is very different with there are many clinical trials running nationwide. 

“However, despite the increasing number of trials, not all centres are currently able to deliver them at pace due to a lack of specialised staff with dedicated time to spend on MND projects.

“Doddie was passionate about the need for more MND clinical trials, to give newly diagnosed people hope and purpose, and to accelerate the search for effective treatments. This commitment of an additional £500,000 to support individual trial centres, will enable them to buy-out the time of specialised staff to work on MND clinical trials, and make a real difference in our ongoing mission to end MND.” 

Our announcement arrives as the public prepares to pull on their favourite tartan in memory of Doddie on what would have been his birthday. Doddie's wife Kathy and two of his sons, Ben and Hamish, helped launch the initiative on social media this week. 

There are no rules on what tartan to wear, although we encourage you to sport Doddie's famous yellow and blue colours on the day, if you can!

We have so far committed more than £11m to MND research, with a further £2m invested in supporting people living with MND. 

The last 12 months have signalled a significant year of fundraising, with a further £6m committed to research by the end of 2024. 

Prizes will be available for the best tartan snaps, with a bottle of Doddie’5 Moonshine or Cap Classique sparkling wine, Doddie merch and a rugby ball up for grabs as part of the competition.

To enter the competition, please upload your image and use the hashtag #myname5doddie. Alternatively, post your pictures as comments on our Facebook and X (formerly Twitter) posts.