Trials - Portfolio

In collaboration with 13 partners from 7 countries, Jena University Hospital is establishing the Antivirus Pandemic Preparedness EuropeAn pLatform (APPEAL), a European research initiative aimed at enhancing preparedness for future pandemics. This EU funded collaboration will establish a comprehensive program for the development of broad-spectrum antiviral drugs within a five year time frame ensuring drug affordability and accessibility to low income countries.

This research initiative aims to establish a platform for the identification of target proteins and their signalling pathways within host cells, utilising both computational and experimental approaches. Subsequently, potential drug candidates will undergo comprehensive testing in our laboratories, including cell culture and human-relevant 3D models. The most promising candidates will then advance to animal studies, and ultimately, validation in a clinical pilot study. The goal is to establish a comprehensive pipeline for the identification and validation of potential antiviral targets and associated drug candidates.

In addition, the scientists also aim to therapeutically activate target proteins that are identified as enhancers of cellular defence processes. For the most promising candidate, the safety and effectiveness of the lead compound will be evaluated in pre-clinical pilot studies.

Population: adult | Intervention type: Interventional Study

AUSTRAL trial: An open-label, multicenter, phase II study of radiotherapy followed by durvalumab (MEDI4736) and ceralasertib (AZD6738) in stage III NSCLC patients with thoracic relapses +/- oligometastases after PACIFIC regimen.

Non-small cell lung cancer is a leading cause of death for cancer worldwide. Approximately 30% of patients have stage III locally advanced disease at diagnosis. 

Standard treatment for patients for whom surgical resection is not feasible is chemoradiotherapy with platinum-based doublet chemotherapy followed by durvalumab maintenance, which has a survival rate of roughly 50% and a significant percentage of patients encounter disease progression within two years from the onset of maintenance treatment. After the first disease progression, treatment options are limited. 

To address this situation, the AUSTRAL trial aims to explore the safety and efficacy of thoracic re-irradiation of oligometastases followed after an interval of 2 to 4 weeks by durvalumab and ceralasertib in patients with thoracic relapses +/- oligometastases after chemoradiotherapy with platinum-based doublet chemotherapy treatment followed by durvalumab maintenance.

Two primary objectives on safety and efficacy have been set and will be hierarchically analysed.

Primary objective:

• To assess the safety and tolerability, in terms of number of grade 3 or higher adverse events judged as at least possibly related to study treatment regimen (radiotherapy followed by systemic therapy with ceralasertib and durvalumab) within 6 months from the start of study treatment.
• To assess the efficacy in terms of Progression Free Survival (PFS), defined as the time from the date of enrolment until the date of first disease progression or death to any cause, whichever comes first.

Secondary objectives:

• To assess the activity in terms of objective response rate (ORR).
• To assess the efficacy in terms of PFS rate at 6 and 12 months, Overall Survival (OS), OS rate at 6 and 12 months. OS is defined as the time from enrolment until the date of death from any cause.
• To assess the safety and tolerability of the treatment. Adverse events will be encoded and graded using NCI-CTCAE version 5.0.

To assess the efficacy in terms of Progression Free Survival (PFS), defined as the time from the date of enrolment until the date of first disease progression or death to any cause, whichever comes first.

Population: Adult (male or female aged 18 years or older).
Number of Patients: 21 evaluable patients.
Study Population: Stage III NSCLC patients with loco-regional relapse > 12 months from the end of CRT +/- < 3 metastatic lesions after PACIFIC regimen or PACIFIC-like regimens (concurrent or sequential chemo-radiotherapy followed by maintenance durvalumab), regardless of PD-L1 status, but without EGFR, HER-2 or MET exon14 skipping mutations, ALK, ROS1, RET or NTRK rearrangements.
Intervention type: Interventional Study.

Heart failure (HF) is a chronic clinical condition involving up to 6.5 million people in Europe, the most frequent cause of hospitalization in adults with a 5-year mortality rate up to 70%. Several drugs positively modify the course of disease in the patients with HF with reduced ejection fraction (HFrEF), with a high level of evidence. Besides, the use of diuretics, the basic cornerstone of symptoms relief in HFrEF by targeting congestion, is supported by poor and outdated evidence. Congestion drives symptoms worsening leading to hospital admission. Clinical evaluation of congestion is often inaccurate and insensitive to detect interstitial or intravascular fluid overload, and thus insufficient to guide use of diuretics. Indeed, their use is inefficient, with studies showing that up to 70% of patients with chronic HFrEF show congestion despite diuretic therapy, the use of diuretics does prevent clinical events in patients discharged after an acute heart failure episode, and diuretics may represent a barrier to adherence to disease modifier therapies. An appropriate management of diuretic therapy is therefore crucial to overcome the risk of re-hospitalisation, manage patients symptoms, and achieve target guideline-directed medical therapy. To fill these gaps, BIOTOOL-CHF will 1) validate a set of qualified biomarkers estimating congestion, 2) define a multiparametric artificial intelligence-based score predicting congestion and prognosis, 3) develop a decision-making tool to manage congestion by diuretics, 4) develop a Point of Care companion diagnostic (CD) to assess biomarkers concentrations 5) set up a Strategy plan for industrial development and market access of the CD. This approach will support the definition of a framework to regulatory agencies and scientific societies to disseminate recommendations for a more efficient use of existing pharmaceuticals and allow a personalised strategy for the management of HFrEF, by using new tools and digital solutions.

Population: adult | Intervention type: Non-interventional

The objective of the study is to assess whether catheter ablation (CA) for atrial fibrillation (AF) can prevent adverse cardiovascular (CV) outcomes in patients with heart failure (HF) with preserved or mildly reduced ejection fraction.

It used to be assumed that atrial fibrillation could cause heart failure, a condition known as tachycardiomyopathy. Today, it is known that the reverse can also occur, namely that heart failure triggers atrial fibrillation. The often rapid and irregular heartbeat that then occurs, in turn worsens the heart failure - a vicious circle begins. To counteract this dangerous combination of heart failure and atrial fibrillation, DZHK scientists are investigating in the CABA-HFPEF-DZHK27 study whether treatment of atrial fibrillation by so-called catheter ablation helps heart failure patients and has a positive effect on their state of health and prognosis. The study focuses on heart failure patients with preserved or only mildly reduced ejection fraction (Heart Failure with Preserved Ejection Fraction, HFPEF, and Heart Failure with mildly reduced Ejection Fraction, HFmrEF).

CABA-HFPEF-DZHK27 is now the first large, multicenter study to investigate this relationship. Across Europe, 60 centers are participating, and 1,550 patients with predefined inclusion and exclusion criteria are expected to participate through the centers. The study is designed to last five years.

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic medical device

CARDIA is designed as non-IMP/non-MD clinical trial. The aim of the study is to compare the outcome of transhiatal extended gastrectomy with transthoracic esophagectomy as curative surgical therapy for patients with GEJ type II adenocarcinomas since nowadays both surgical strategies are in use with ambivalent results regarding oncological outcome, postoperative morbidity, and quality of life.

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic procedural

The objective of the study is to determine whether, among extremely low birth weight (ELBW - birth weight less than 1000g) infants, early targeted treatment with Paracetamol for patent ductus arteriosus (PDA), based on specific criteria and commencing between six to twelve hours of life, results in significant reduction of a combined primary outcome of periventricular and intraventricular haemorrhage (PIVH), necrotising enterocolitis (NEC) and death before discharge. The Trial design is a Phase 3 randomised, parallel-group, placebo-controlled trial.

Analysis will be carried out as intention to treat. For the analysis of the primary end point a mixed-effects logistic regression model will be used. The fixed covariates will be the treatment group and weight as a continuous variable. The centre will be included in the model as a random intercept (i.e. fixed + random effects = mixed effects), which will adjust for centre-specific variance. By this approach a precision and statistical power will be gained (with potential ability to describe smaller, but significant effects). The trial statistician will prepare a Statistical Analysis Plan.

A sample size of 218 infants is needed with 109 infants in each arm, (using corrected chi-square test and Fischer’s Exact test), to decrease the rate of our combined outcome from 32% to 15% (17% absolute reduction), with alpha 5% and 80% power.

Population: paediatric | Intervention type: therapeutic procedural

A randomised controlled, adaptive, multicentre Phase II protocol evaluating different booster strategies in individuals aged 75 years and older already vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2. Part B of this trial foresees testing of different vaccines as a 4th vaccination dose (second booster) for comparative assessment of their immunogenicity and safety against SARSCoV-2 wild-type and variants in the elderly, a usually neglected population.
Additional vaccines and extended follow-up visits can be added through amendments of this sub-protocol. As stated in the EU-COVAT master protocol, this trial, i.e., the EU-COVAT-1_AGED study, implements a specific safety monitoring strategy .

Population: adult | Intervention type: vaccine

The overarching objective is to evaluate anti-SARS-CoV-2 immune responses to different booster strategies in individuals already vaccinated against SARS-CoV-2. Specifically, this subprotocol will determine the need for, optimal timing of and immunogenicity of administering a 4th homologous vaccination dose against SARS-CoV-2 in the general population (18+ years) who have already been vaccinated with three doses of the BNT162b2 vaccine.

Population: adult | Intervention type: vaccine

The EU-SolidAct trial – European DisCoVeRy for Solidarity: An Adaptive Pandemic and Emerging Infection Platform Trial – is part of EU-RESPONSE, a pan-European research project involved with the rapid and coordinated investigation of medications to treat COVID-19 during the ongoing pandemic. The EU-SolidAct (EudraCT: 2021-000541-41; clinicaltrials.gov ID NCT04891133) is a multi-center, randomized, adaptive Phase 2 and 3 platform trial, the master protocol of which has been developed to evaluate potential treatments in hospitalised patients with COVID-19, the disease caused by the SARS-CoV2 virus (coronavirus). Under the trial, bemcentinib will be studied in up to 500 hospitalised COVID-19 patients. In support of the trial, BerGenBio will provide bemcentinib drug material and incremental funding of costs related to the bemcentinib sub-protocol. 

The first drug studied under the EU-SolidAct platform was baricitinib, marketed by Eli Lilly and Company, and is now under market authorisation evaluation by the EMA (European Medicines Agency) for use in hospitalised COVID-19 patients.  BerGenBio’s AXL inhibitor, bemcentinib, has been selected by an international expert group to be the second compound to be studied in the EU-SolidAct platform.

EU-SolidAct has established clinical sites in 15 countries. The trial is sponsored by Oslo University Hospital, Norway in collaboration with the Institut National de la Santé Et de la Recherche Médicale (Inserm), France and the not-for-profit intergovernmental organization European Clinical Research Infrastructure Network (ECRIN). The trial through the EU-RESPONSE project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 101015736. Individual patient-level data will be made as public as possible while maintaining the integrity and privacy of the trial participants.

Population: adult

The EU-TRAIN project was formed by gathering reference kidney transplant centres in a fully operating European network including 12 partners. Our ambitious but realistic goals are: to provide clinicians with innovative and accessible tools for early prediction of individual risk of allograft rejection and transplant loss; to personalise clinical management and treatment and; to improve allograft outcomes.
This project will engineer a risk stratification system applied to kidney transplant patients by analysing the integration of several layers of data (clinical, histological, immunological data as well as gene expression and novel biomarkers) - the TRAnsplant Comprehensive Evaluator of Risk (EU-TRACER). EU-TRACER will be generated and validated in two dedicated studies including a randomised control trial.

Population: adult | Intervention type: non-interventional

This randomized trial is based on the hypothesis that the combined use of (1) biomarkers including non‐invasive biomarkers in peripheral blood and urine predicting anti‐donor immunological activation or quiescence, and high/low risk clustering using the transcriptional changes in allograft tissue samples using gene expression assessment and (2) interactive and actionable data analytics delivered at the bedside will promote safe clinical follow‐up of kidney transplant patients without the need for invasive surveillance allograft biopsies to assess allograft rejection in clinically stable kidney transplant patients. We therefore propose a with/without, European, multicenter, prospective randomized and biomarker‐guided trial.

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic medicinal product

The study will be a multi-national, multi-centre longitudinal observational study with the aim to evaluate the performance of the candidate digital endpoints of fatigue and sleep disturbance in the following neurodegenerative disorders (Parkinson’s disease and Huntington’s disease) and immune-mediated inflammatory diseases (Inflammatory bowel disease, rheumatoid arthritis, systemic lupus erythematosus and primary Sjögren’s syndrome). Healthy volunteers without symptoms of chronic fatigue or sleep disturbance will also be include as a comparative group.

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic medical device

ImmunAID is seeking to enable a rapid and accurate diagnosis across all the spectrum of SAID, in order to improve clinical management of SAID patients, through a graded approach:
- Identification and validation of novel Omics- and pathway-based diagnostic biomarkers, with a strong link to pathogenic pathways involved in autoinflammation, and likely to be considered as genuine “autoinflammation signatures”;
- Development of a robust clinical decision algorithm to assist physicians, having a progressive and targeted approach (triage process) when facing a patient with suspected SAID, and thus avoiding the prescription of a large number of costly and frequently inadequate diagnostic investigations in parallel;

The ImmunAID research will likely lead to the reorganization of SAID into a new comprehensive and pathogenesis-driven classification with strong clinical impact.

Population: adult & paediatric

The aim of this trial is to determine preliminary activity of the combination treatment with nivolumab and entinostat in children and adolescents with high risk refractory/relapsed/progressive tumors harboring a high mutational load, high PD-L1 mRNA expression or focal MYC(N) amplification and explore activity in biomarker low tumors (low mutational load, low PD-L1 mRNA expression and non-MYC(N) amplified).

Population: paediatric | Intervention type: therapeutic medicinal product

The LEOPARD project stands as a pioneering effort in the field of liver transplantation (LT), uniting stakeholders across Europe to revolutionise organ allocation strategies for individuals with decompensated cirrhosis (DC) and hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC).

Among patients currently listed for liver transplantation in Europe, mortality/drop-out on the waitlist averages 15-20% with large disparities across European countries. In recognition of the critical need to prioritise LT candidates based on mortality risk, particularly in the context of organ shortages, and the limitations of existing predictive models such as the Model for End-Stage Liver Disease (MELD) in accurately assessing this risk, there is a growing urgency for updated algorithms to refine organ offering schemes.

The LEOPARD project seeks to enhance liver transplantation outcomes by creating and validating an AI-based predictive algorithm, considering recently identified predictors, that surpasses current models in stratifying both DC and HCC patients by mortality/dropout risks on the waitlist. Additionally, the project will develop calculators for DC and HCC candidates to aid in patient prioritisation, as well as integrate predictive signatures from OMICs/radiomics to improve risk assessment accuracy.

At its core, the LEOPARD project aims to improve patient outcomes by ensuring timely transplantations, harmonising European prioritisation schemes, and advocating for equitable access to LT to significantly reduce mortality on the waitlist. 

Population: adult | Intervention type: interventional excluding health product

LIVERATION is a comprehensive, practical, and multinational clinical trial spanning six countries, with the objective of investigating if the enlargement of the ablated margin through radiofrequency can reduce the recurrence of Colorectal Cancer Liver Metastasis (CRLM) and enhance patient longevity.

Colorectal cancer (CRC) is the third most common tumour in men and the second in women, with an estimate of 1.9 million new cases worldwide (450K in Europe) and approximately 900,000 deaths in 2020. Hepatic metastases develop in approximately 50% of colorectal cancer cases.

The liver, in addition to being the most common site of metastases, is also the first and only area of spread in 30–40% of patients.Surgery is considered the gold standard treatment and the only potentially curative option for colorectal liver metastases (CRLM).

LIVERATION leverages a prospective pragmatic clinical trial coordinated by expert clinicians and surgeons on liver cancer that had achieved promising preliminary results: a reduction of cancer local recurrence by adding an additional coagulation of the margin (ACM) with radiofrequency (RF) ablation devices compared to conventional hemostatic techniques in a retrospective clinical trial.

The main aim of LIVERATION is to evaluate the real-world effectiveness of ACM after liver resection in order to decrease liver cancer recurrence through a pragmatic clinical trial.

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic procedural

The objective of the LIVERHOPE project is to evaluate a novel therapeutic strategy for patients with cirrhosis based on a combination of rifaximin and simvastatin, targeting the main pathophysiological mechanisms of disease progression , namely the impairment in the gut-liver axis and the persistent hepatic and systemic inflammatory response. This dual therapeutic approach is supported by preclinical data showing excellent and very promising results.
LIVERHOPE will include two randomized double-blind trials (LIVERHOPE SAFETY and LIVERSHOPE EFFICACY) to investigate safety, tolerability and efficacy of combination of simvastatin plus rifaximin in patients with decompensated cirrhosis in six EU countries (285 patients will be enrolled in two trials in Germany, France, Italy, Spain, The Netherlands, and the United Kingdom). The expected impact is to halt progression to acute-on-chronic liver failure, the main cause of death, to decrease complications of the disease, to reduce hospital re-admissions, to improve cost-effectiveness of therapy.
The aim of the LIVERHOPE SAFETY trial is to assess the safety and tolerability of oral administration of simvastatin plus rifaximin in patients with decompensated cirrhosis.
The aim of LIVERHOPE EFFICACY is to assess the efficacy of the combination of simvastatin plus rifaximin in patients with decompensated cirrhosis to prevent ACLF development.

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic medicinal product

The major objective is to develop novel clinical endpoints for clinical trials with a regulatory and patient access intention in patients with intermediate age-related macular degeneration (iAMD). Additional objectives are to characterise visual impairment in iAMD and its progression, as well as identify risk factors for progression to late stage AMD.

Population: adult | Intervention type: non-interventional study

Venous thromboembolism (VTE) is a frequent and life-threatening disease. In 50% of cases, VTE occurs in the absence of any major risk factors (unprovoked VTE). In these patients, when anticoagulation is stopped after 3 months of anticoagulation, more than 35% will develop recurrent VTE. Consequently, international guidelines recommend to treat these patients “indefinitely”. However, such practice exposes them to a substantial increase risk of bleeding. Nevertheless, after several years of anticoagulation in all patients with unprovoked VTE, the risk of anticoagulant-related bleeding is expected to exceed the risk of recurrent VTE after stopping treatment.

In addition, extending anticoagulation indefinitely in all patients with unprovoked VTE exposes 65% of patients to an unjustified high risk of bleeding, who would never have experienced recurrent VTE after stopping treatment. In this setting, optimal duration and management of anticoagulation remains a pivotal and unresolved challenging issue which has the potential to markedly improve long-term prognosis of unprovoked VTE.

Based on quantitative and qualitative approaches, MORPHEUS will for the first time integrate (i) clinical, laboratory and imaging biomarkers (personalized medicine) and (ii) socio-anthropological markers (patient-centred model) into sets of prediction rules for optimizing anticoagulant management integrated in a shared decision-making process.

The ultimate goal of the European MORPHEUS project will be to develop and validate a time-dependent multi-component tool integrated in a shared decision-making process regarding anticoagulant treatment duration in patients with unprovoked VTE.

Population: adult | Intervention type: Non-interventional

Primary Sjögren’s syndrome (pSS) is a systemic autoimmune disease (AID) involving 0.5 to 3/1000 persons. The disease affects exocrine glands leading to dryness of the eyes and the mouth and is associated with fatigue and limb pain. In 30% to 50% of the patients, systemic and extra-glandular manifestations may develop. The spectrum of extra-glandular
manifestations in pSS is broad and includes vasculitis, peripheral neuropathy, synovitis, kidney involvement and interstitial lung disease. Moreover, pSS patients have a 10 to 20-fold higher risk of developing B cell lymphomas, conferring shorter lifetime expectancy to these patients.
Whereas 10 new targeted-immunomodulatory treatments have been marketed for rheumatoid arthritis in the past 20 years, only one drug has been licensed for other systemic AIDs, such as pSS and systemic erythematous lupus in the same period. There are several factors that may hamper the development of successful drugs for AID. Being multi-organ, these AIDs are considerably heterogeneous among individuals both in terms of clinical manifestations and biological disturbances, with, as a consequence, great difficulty to set-up accurate composite clinical end-points sensitive to change and usable in clinical trials. In this project, our objectives are:
- To develop and assess sensitive clinical endpoints, for use in future clinical trials, able to evaluate response to drug treatments in patients with pSS with high disease burden and/or systemic involvement,
- To identify and evaluate discriminative biomarkers for stratification of pSS patients predictive of organ involvement and disease progression and thus available for inclusion in clinical trials,
- To set-up and perform an original multi-arm multi-stage clinical trial to validate the newly defined pSS endpoints and the identified biomarkers, by maximizing the chance of finding a difference between the placebo arm and the treated arm.

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic medicinal product

Spinal cord injury is a severe and devastating neurological disorder that leaves patients with permanent paralysis of the body. No treatment is available today to regenerate interrupted nerve fibers and repair the damaged spinal cord. The incidence of spinal cord injury is about newly injured 10’000 people per year in the EU, and due to an almost normal life expectancy more than 200’000 patients are living with a spinal cord injury in the EU. The impact on the individual quality of life is high, and social costs are enormous. Recent preclinical research in animal models succeeded to greatly enhance axonal sprouting, fiber regeneration and neuroplasticity following injuries of brain and spinal cord. These results warrant translation now to patients suffering from acute spinal cord injury. A previous phase I clinical study using intrathecal application of a nerve fiber growth promoting antibody against the growth inhibitory protein Nogo-A has shown in patients with complete spinal cord injury that this treatment is safe and well tolerated. The present study will enroll patients with various degrees of complete to incomplete acute spinal cord injury for a double-blind, placebo-controlled trial to test the efficacy of this antibody therapy to improve motor outcome and quality of life of tetraplegic patients. The enrollment of patients with different degrees of spinal cord injury is considered essential to reveal drug activity and eventual proof of concept in a broad patient population. Advancements in clinical trial design, improved prediction algorithms of clinical outcomes and development of surrogate markers (in cerebro-spinal fluid/serum and by neuroimaging) will allow for scrutinizing the effectiveness of this novel treatment in an unprecedented way. A positive outcome of this trial will represent a breakthrough for the future therapy of spinal cord injuries and beyond (traumatic brain injury, stroke, multiple sclerosis).

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic medicinal product

The overall aim of the PROACT EU-Response project is to prepare Europe for future diseases of epidemic or pandemic potential by strengthening and building upon existing networks of experts and civil society focused on clinical therapeutic platform trials within hospital inpatient settings across Europe.
This network will provide the capacity to pivot rapidly in the event of an outbreak to implement large, multi-country platform trials investigating drug efficacy and performance of diagnostic tools, with a strong patient and public involvement. The civil society and community at large are engaged in the planning of the trials as well as in designing specific activities concerning communication and information for the public about health threats and how to avoid disinformation, particularly during an epidemic or pandemic.
This project is led by ANRS-MIE, Inserm and Sorbonne University, as part of a consortium of 20 European countries and 23 partners, including many teams in biostatistics, clinical research and social sciences, as well as numerous associations and citizens' groups.
Population: adult | Intervention type: Interventional Study

TENSION is a prospective, open label, blinded endpoint (PROBE), European two-arm, randomized, controlled, post-market study to compare the safety and effectiveness of endovascular thrombectomy as compared to best medical care alone in the treatment of acute ischemic stroke patients with extended stroke lesions defined by an Alberta Stroke Program Early CT Score (ASPECTS) score of 3-5 and in an extended time window (up to 12 hours or unknown time of symptom onset). Up to 714 subjects will be randomized. Primary endpoint will be functional outcome assessed by the modified Rankin scale at 90 days post-stroke ("mRS shift analysis"). By this, TENSION will provide evidence of efficacy and safety of thrombectomy in an acute stroke population with uncertain benefit of endovascular stroke treatment.

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic medical device

To define an optimal dosage of intravenous acetaminophen to close DA in EPI and thereafter to evaluate the consequence of early prophylactic acetaminophen treatment on mortality/morbidity at 36 weeks (w) of postconceptional age (PCA).

Population: paediatric | Intervention type: therapeutic medicinal product

End stage renal disease (ESRD) causes high socioeconomic burden for citizens and the healthcare system in Europe. Kidney transplantation represents the treatment standard for ESRD. Graft rejection due to inadequate immunosuppression is the leading cause for chronic graft dysfunction and infectious disease due to reduced immune function is a major cause of death. Optimisation of immunosuppressive drugs is a crucial step to minimize the risk of infection and rejection and thereby prolonging patient and graft survival.

The peripheral blood copy number of the highly prevalent and non-pathogenic Torque Teno virus (TTV) is associated with the grade of the immunosuppression of the host. Non-interventional studies suggest superiority of TTV copy number guided immunosuppression compared to standard strategies.

To demonstrate the safety and preliminary efficacy of TTV-guided dosing of immunosuppressive drugs in kidney transplant recipients, a phase II clinical trial comparing infection and rejection rate between TTV-guided immunosuppression and the clinical routine strategy.

TTV allows for a comprehensive and personalised assessment of the function of the immune system. For the first time this novel and original approach will be tested in an interventional randomised and controlled setting.

The proposed project has the potential to reduce infection and graft rejection by 20% thereby significantly improving graft and patient survival of kidney transplant patients. The improved survival will reduce healthcare costs by ~€ 50 million in the EU per year. The project will serve as a proof-of-concept for TTV-based assessment of the immune system, with potential applications in solid organ transplantation, autoimmune and infectious disease and oncology.

The TTV Guide project also built information videos and information regarding the consent process and ethical legal social implication study that is integrated into the TTV Guide IT clinical trial. 

Population: adult | Intervention type: therapeutic medical device