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Department of Acute Care and Recovery SciencesTidewater University
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Research group4 studies3 people

Inflammation and Healing Lab

How the body's immune response shapes healing after major surgery.

Email the group[email protected]

The lab studies blood and tissue markers that predict who will heal well and who is at risk of complications, and tests simple ways to steer recovery in the right direction.

Themes this group works in

Our people

  • Professor Marguerite Ashdown

    Group Leader

    Marguerite trained in general surgery before moving into laboratory research. Her work links immune signals in the first days after surgery to longer-term recovery.

    EmailORCID

  • Dr Clara Vossberg

    Postdoctoral Research Fellow

    Clara runs the lab’s biomarker platform and leads its work on wound healing in older adults.

  • Noah Pemberley

    PhD Candidate

    Noah’s doctoral project looks at whether a simple blood test on day two can flag patients who need closer follow-up.

Our research

The studies listed on this page are run or led by the group. Each one is entered once and also appears on the matching theme pages.

  • Healing in Later Life

    Why do wounds heal more slowly in some older adults, and what can we do about it?

    In progressEthics TEST/2025/088

  • Healing Signals in the Lab

    Laboratory work on stored samples, mapping which immune signals switch on in the first days of wound repair.

Our publications

Selected papers

Early blood markers and complications after bowel surgery: a cohort study

Ashdown M, Vossberg C, Pemberley N, et al. Journal of Example Surgery, 2026. doi:10.5555/example.2026.001

In plain language

We measured inflammation in the blood of 400 people on the second day after bowel surgery. People with high levels were three times more likely to develop a complication, which suggests a simple test could help teams decide who needs closer monitoring.

All publications

2026

  • Inflammatory markers on the second post-operative day: a validation studyVossberg C, Pemberley N, Ashdown M. Example Surgical Science, 2026. doi:10.5555/example.2026.101

2025

All news and media

  • Wound Check by Phone is open

    Reposted from the Inflammation and Healing Lab's LinkedIn page. The lab's new study asks whether wound photos sent from home can spot infection early.