Prof Hook, of the university School of Pharmacy, was one
of four Otago researchers to each gain a $150,000 explorer grant, amounting to the largest share by any one university of 11 such grants throughout the country, announced by the Health Research Council today.
The grants amount to $1.65million overall.
Prof Hook said the HRC funding would ''really allow us to see'' if the proposed concept would ''fly''.
She was optimistic of the outcome, given ''a great concept and a group of researchers with the expertise to make it happen''.
The project aims to develop a unique test that doctors could use on a patient at their bedside to quickly find out if a strain of bacteria is resistant to a particular antibiotic.
Patients would be given a test dose of an anitbiotic, and doctors could check the sensitivity of bacteria in a drop of blood taken from the patient using a handheld device similar to those used for testing glucose levels.
If her cross-disciplinary team of researchers from Otago University and Victoria University of Wellington was successful their new point-of-care detection system would dramatically alter how antibiotics are prescribed and used.
Doctors could determine drug resistance much faster than they could at present.
This would allow them to ''switch to an effective drug, potentially saving the patient's life'' but would also help reduce antibiotic resistance by deploying drugs more effectively.
Other Otago explorer grant recipients were Dr Azam Ali, of applied sciences; Dr Jaydee Cabral, of chemistry; and Associate Prof Alexander McLellan, of microbiology and immunology.
