Professor John Porter

Professional statement

Professor John Porter is a consultant haematologist at the University College London Hospitals and head of the Joint Red Cell Unit for UCLH and Whittington Hospitals.

He graduated from the University of Cambridge in 1974 was awarded an FRCP by the Royal London College of Physicians in 1995 and FRCPath in Haematology by the Royal College of Pathologists in 1996.

Professor Porter's clinical and research focus has been treatments of thalassaemia and sickle cell disorders, with particular reference to iron overload, the mechanisms of iron chelation, the speciation and uptake of non-transferrin-bound iron (NTBI) species, the molecular basis of iron homeostasis in health and disease, and the actions and toxicities of mixed-ligand chelation therapies.

He has received funding from many sources including the Medical Research Council (MRC), the Welcome Foundation and National Institutes of Health (NIH) for this work. Professor Porter has been the principal UK investigator in numerous multicentre clinical trials on iron chelation and is currently the principal UK investigator on ongoing trials with Luspatercept for correcting anaemia in thalassaemias (Celgene) and gene therapy for thalassaemia (Bluebird Bio).

What's more, he has published more than 350 peer-reviewed articles with over 10,000 citations and an H index of 52. He has also made numerous contributions to books, as well as clinical guidelines and other medical articles. He has served as scientific adviser to the British Society of Haematology, the UK Thalassaemia Society, the Thalassaemia International Federation (TIF), and to grant review and advisory panels at the NIH in Bethesda, MD, USA.

In 1999 he was awarded the Lionel Whitby Medal for MD of exceptional merit by Cambridge University. In 2008 he received the Prix Gallien at the houses of parliament on behalf of Novartis for 'Deferasirox as outstanding orphan drug'. In 2015 he received the SITA international award for outstanding international clinical thalassaemia centre at UCLH. In 2017 he received the IBIS Marcel Simon award from the International BioIron society for excellence in research on Non-transferrin bound iron (NTBI). He is the recent recipient of the British Society of Haematology Gold Medal award.