UCLan professor to host talk on how he went from the back of a cop car to the front of a ‘copter

Professor Stuart Maitland-Knibb is a world-leading expert in delivering urgent care and emergency medicine in remote locations – however his journey to the top of his profession has been anything but straightforward.

Stuart is the Director of the University of Central Lancashire’s National Centre of Remote and Rural Medicine, based at its Westlakes Campus in Cumbria.

As well as being a leading academic, he has also taken on prominent roles as a consultant helicopter emergency medic and a member of the UK search and rescue team. His long and varied medical career has taken him over land and sea to some of the world’s most challenging and hostile environments.

It’s a far cry from Stuart’s early life when he emerged from a broken home to struggle through a world of drugs and violence. He walked away from school with no qualifications after being expelled – and to this day he has no A Levels at all. His lowest point came when he found himself in the back of a police car after being arrested for a firearms offence.

Stuart is now set to share more details of his inspiring life story via a series of free public lectures organised by UCLan. The Preston lecture will take place on Wednesday 15 May at Darwin Lecture Theatre in Marsh Lane.

During the talks, Stuart will describe how he eventually turned his life around and rose to become one of the country’s leading medical experts. His insights will demonstrate why you should never accept, or be limited by, other people’s ideas of what is and isn’t possible for your own journey.

Doors will open at 6.30pm and refreshments will be available at. The talk will take place between 7pm and 8pm and there will be a short Q&A session afterwards.

The lecture is open to anyone aged 14 and up, and is ticket only, available from Eventbrite.

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