ROSSINI Platform

We will open 100 hospitals across the UK and recruit 26,000 patients undergoing surgery in 6 surgical specialties (‘pillars’): ​

• Vascular groin, ​
• Lower limb amputation (LLA),​
• Obstetric, ​
• Breast, ​
• Neurosurgery, or​
• Cardiac Surgery.

Consisting of 6 individual full-scale pragmatic, outcome assessor blinded, stratified, multi-arm multi-stage 2x2x2 factorial RCTs, which means a total, of 18 interventions are being assessed in the trial, with examples including:

• using state-of-the-art wound cleaning solutions during surgery
• using special wound dressings after surgery,
• applying antibiotics differently during surgery,
• changing gloves and instruments at certain points during surgery,
• waxing or epilation around the surgical site

The ROSSINI Platform is looking at how to best reduce those infections and the results will mean the doctors will know which methods to use to improve patient care.​

The objectives of the trial are to understand which interventions are best at reducing post-surgical infections and therefore reduce complications associated with those infections. If an intervention is shown to be beneficial in one surgical specialty or ‘pillar’ it can be tested across other pillars within this trial. Interventions or ‘arms may be changed throughout the trial’.

 The outcome of the trial will be that surgeons have evidence for the best interventions to use to prevent post-surgical infections, which are the most common healthcare associated infection.

The primary outcome being measured is surgical site infection at 30 days.

A multi-speciality platform trial consisting of 6 individual full-scale pragmatic, outcome assessor blinded, stratified, multi-arm multi-stage 2x2x2 factorial RCTs. This means that under the protocol of one trial there will be six pillars with three interventions each running in parallel.

The Trial is receiving £10 million funding over 5 years from NIHR

27th February 2025: University of Birmingham: "Largest ever UK surgical trial to make future operations safer"

To express an interest in taking part, or to request more information on the trial, please contact the ROSSINI Platform study team:

 rossini-platform@contacts.bham.ac.uk