Sudden cardiac death (SCD) is a major public health problem accounting for ~20% of all deaths in Europe with an estimated yearly incidence of ~350-700,000, often in patients with previous myocardial infarction (MI). In SCD, the heart suddenly and unexpectedly stops beating. If untreated, the patient dies within minutes, but SCD can be successfully prevented by an implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD). The ICD is highly effective, but is associated with potentially severe complications and high healthcare costs. Based on historical evidence, guidelines recommend prophylactic ICD implantation in post-MI patients with left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF)≤35% to prevent SCD. However, only a minority of these patients will ever need the device. In addition, in absolute numbers the majority of SCD cases occurs in patients with LVEF>35% who are currently not considered for prophylactic ICD. Due to the inherent risks and considerable health care expenditures, a personalised treatment approach for ICD implantation is urgently required. Using state-of-the-art methods and large clinical datasets from established international cohorts and registries across different European geographies, PROFID will develop a clinical decision support tool (risk score) to predict the individual SCD risk and identify those post-MI patients that will optimally benefit from an ICD. Two parallel randomised clinical trials will validate implementation of the risk score to determine ICD implantation, while health economic analyses will assess its economic impact on health care systems. A software tool for clinical use of the risk score will be implemented, and a pilot run in 3 European regions with participation of insurance companies and authorities. The unique composition of the consortium with key opinion leaders, patient organisations, large hospital chains, payers, policy makers and state authorities across Europe, will ensure implementation into routine clinical practice.

Background: EU countries face large health challenges to combat chronic diseases. Recently, systems medicine has emerged as a promising discipline to accelerate the translation of basic research into applications for improved diagnostics and personalized treatment. Its power arises from the integration of laboratory and computational approaches crossing research disciplines and sectors to solve clinical questions. COSMIC delivers the next generation of leading, entrepreneurial, and innovative systems medicine professionals having expertise, skills, and experience to successfully combat complex human disorders. These professional will find excellent career opportunities. COSMIC focuses on B-cell neoplasia and rheumatoid arthritis, prototypical diseases originating from abnormal functioning of immune cells, often resulting in similar antigen specificities. COSMIC enables Early Stage Researchers to play a leading role in this exciting field. Approach: COSMIC develops and integrate experimental and computational approaches and establish a unique cross-fertilization between oncology and auto-immunity. In addition to transferable skills, the training program focuses on establishing a double expertise in laboratory and computational to address clinical questions. It involves a wide-range of stakeholders: (pre)clinical departments, companies, patient groups, students, and the general public. COSMIC will establish a link with the leading European EASyM and ISBE initiatives, and aims to harmonize systems medicine training throughout Europe by connecting to other EU (Marie Curie systems medicine) training initiatives. Impact: COSMIC (i) significantly improves ESR career perspectives (ii) leads to new public-private collaborations increasing competitiveness for companies; (iii) contributes to future oncology and immunology medical care; (iv) contributes to the EU systems medicine best practices.

Genen beïnvloeden veel aspecten van gedrag, zoals persoonlijkheid en mentale gezondheidsproblemen. Maar hoe beïnvloeden deze genen de hersenen? Deze kennis is cruciaal, omdat het kan helpen bij het verbeteren van ons begrip van gedrag. De ENIGMA-EEG-groep onderzoekt hoe genen voor gedrag de hersenactiviteit beïnvloeden, de zogenaamde "hersengolven". Beïnvloeden genen de communicatie tussen hersengebieden, het evenwicht in hersenactiviteit? Of beïnvloeden genen hoe hersenen op een leeftijdsgebonden manier functioneren, of veroorzaken ze snellere of langzamere rijping of veroudering? In dit proces kunnen we cruciale nieuwe hersengolfpatronen ontdekken die wijzen op mentale gezondheidsaandoeningen.