Abstract
In 2016, the Board of the Acta Radiologica Foundation decided that an international prize should be awarded annually for the best scientific manuscript from a non-Nordic country, consisting of a diploma and SEK 40,000.
After a formal voting procedure, the section editors of Acta Radiologica have decided that the Acta Radiologica International Prize 2022 should be awarded to Dr med. Elke Maurer (Fig. 1) from Trauma and Reconstructive Surgery, BG Unfallklinik Tuebingen, Germany, for her article “Association between cardiovascular risk factors and degenerative disc disease of the thoracolumbar spine in the general population: results from the KORA MRI Study” (1).
Dr med. Elke Maurer.
Dr med. Elke Maurer was born in 1987 in Germany and got her MD at Eberhard-Karls-University Tuebingen in 2014. Dr med. Elke Maurer is currently working as an attending physician at Trauma and Reconstructive Surgery, BG Unfallklinik Tuebingen.
Dr med. Elke Maurer has authored/co-authored 33 papers in peer-reviewed journals – one in Acta Radiologica.
The aim of this award-winning study was to evaluate the potential association between cardiovascular risk factors (CRF) and disc degeneration (DD). The authors found a significant association between age, body mass index, and intervertebral DD. In contrast, there was no significant association between CRF and DD, providing strong evidence that the pathologic process undergirding DD is mechanical rather than microvascular in nature.
The Prize consists of SEK 40,000 and a diploma. The official presentation of the Prize will take place during the Nordic Congress of Radiology in Helsinki at the Acta Radiologica Award Session in May 2023.
The Editorial Board congratulates Dr med. Elke Maurer for winning the 2022 International Scientific Prize.
Editor in Chief, Acta Radiologica