Lifetime achievement award presented to Professor Simon Rogers
01 July 2025
The Down Surgical Prize was presented to Professor Simon Rogers, surgeon at Wirral University Teaching Hospital and formally University Hospital Aintree, during the awards ceremony on the opening day of the BAOMS Annual Scientific Meeting. The prestigious prize is awarded annually to an individual who has made a major contribution to oral and maxillofacial surgery in the widest sense and is considered a high honour in the Association.
The Prize acknowledges Professor Rogers’ achievements over his 25 year career as a consultant. He has written hundreds of papers on patient reported outcomes and quality of life outcomes as well as book chapters, while working as a busy full time NHS consultant doing major cancer surgery. He was extremely proud but surprised when he was given the award:
“ Maxfac is a great speciality to be active in and it’s been a privilege to help the patients I’ve cared for. My career has been hugely enjoyable and this has made it relatively easy to be tremendously busy both clinically and academically. It is true to say that the award is not only for me but it recognises my family too, who have been extremely tolerant of my long hours and commitment to work.”
Professor Rogers was drawn to oral and maxillofacial surgery because of his love of creating things as a youngster in the art room and design and technology lab at school. He says: “I used to love sculpture, woodwork and metalwork, all of which are about creating things, and later I realised I could use those same skills on the face in the theatre and in surgery.”
The focus of Professor Rogers’ work has been on the subject of patient reported outcome and quality of life. He was instrumental in the development of one of the most commonly reported quality of life questionnaires used in head and neck cancer world-wide. He has also developed the Patient Concerns Inventory which has been robustly validated and used both nationally and internationally in head and neck cancer but also developed in several other medical conditions.
During the BAOMS meeting, Professor Rogers participated in the Head and Neck Symposium, presenting on: UK and global treatment burden, disparities and the opportunities for improvement based on feedback from patients reporting health related quality of life and concerns. He spoke about the impact of health economics on individual patients, in particular making treatment decisions with patients within the context of their cultural background and health care setting.
He says: “Allowing a patient to make their own informed choices based on the treatments that are available is of crucial importance. A holistic and individual approach is necessary to account for issues such as social deprivation, ethnicity, financial burden, and patients priorities. And beyond this, I believe that as maxillofacial surgeons, we need to be passionate enough to drive forward healthcare agendas beyond our own practice to really improve outcomes for the patients we serve regardless of health economics.”
Professor Rogers concludes: “I think when one sees a patient and their carers who are suffering with the cancer diagnosis or treatment, and one appreciates the enormity of that, it really drives one forwards to try to do best for that patient. Although the operations are long, complex and exhausting, they can be completely absorbing, and with a good team ethos I know that we make a huge difference to the lives of our patients so the long hours never really felt like hard work.”
View Other News