National research alliances

The DZIF transplant cohort is unique in Germany and is intended to help improve the treatment of patients who have already received a donor organ or stem cell transplant.

In order to prevent the rejection of a transplanted organ, recipients of donor organs are dependent on taking immunosuppressive medication for the rest of their lives. This drug-induced weakening of the immune response leads to an increased susceptibility to infections, which in turn can seriously endanger the transplanted organ and the health of the recipient.

The individual factors and correlations between immunosuppression and various infectious diseases have not yet been sufficiently researched. For this reason, medical data and biological samples from transplanted patients are being collected throughout Germany as part of the DZIF transplant cohort. In January 2021, 1661 patients have been included: recruitment continues.

Current and future research projects use the collected data and samples to answer existing scientific questions regarding infections after organ transplantation with the aim of improving the prevention and treatment of infections in practice.

Living kidney donation is an optimal therapy for terminal chronic kidney failure. In Germany in particular, there are only a few study data on the physical and mental well-being of living donors.

In the SOLKID-GNR (Living Kidney Donor Registry) project, which is funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), scientists and clinicians from a wide range of disciplines (transplantation medicine, psychology/psychosomatics, nephrology, surgery, urology, biometry) are working together.

Within five years, a Germany-wide register will be set up to identify and research potential risk factors for complications in donors. In addition to physiological factors such as kidney function and blood pressure, psychosocial consequences of kidney donation will also be recorded.

The aim of the study is to provide future donors with a well-founded risk assessment and information, as well as the development of donor-centered care and prevention strategies.

As one of the world's largest cohort studies on kidney failure, the German Chronic Kidney Disease Study aims to improve the prognosis and quality of life of kidney patients.

Doctors and scientists at eleven university hospitals across Germany are cooperating with more than three hundred nephrologists in private practice under the auspices of the German Society of Nephrology (DGfN) to establish a comprehensive national prospective observational study with 5,000 patients with kidney disease. Heidelberg has been actively involved as a regional center in this largest cooperation project in German nephrology since 2009.

The patients included have moderate renal function impairment (equivalent to GFR stage III) and are observed for more than ten years. Using state-of-the-art analysis methods (e.g. genomics, proteomics), risk factors, new biomarkers and therapeutic approaches to prevent the progression of renal function loss and the occurrence of cardiovascular complications are to be identified.

Overall management:
Prof. Dr. T. Schulz, Hannover Medical School

Project management at the Heidelberg site:
Prof. Dr. C. Sommerer (co-applicant and member of the Steering Committee) and Prof. Dr. C. Morath (member of the Executive Board)

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Overall management:
Prof. Dr. B. Suwelack, University Hospital Münster

Project management at the Heidelberg site:
Prof. Dr. C. Sommerer (co-applicant and member of the steering committee)

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Overall management:
Prof. Dr. Kai-Uwe Eckardt, Charite University Medicine Berlin, Medical Clinic IV, Erlangen

Project management at the Heidelberg site:
Prof. Dr. C. Sommerer (member of the steering committee)

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