Biorepository and Patient Registry
Health care has moved into an exciting era of “precision” medicine, and amazing advances have been made in molecular and cellular biology over the past decade that have dramatically changed our understanding of factors that mediate gastrointestinal health and disease.
Through precision medicine, the care of patients has been increasingly guided by the molecular characterization of their diseases, which has allowed care providers to more accurately diagnose GI illnesses, determine prognosis, and predict the risk of disease and response to therapy.
While many diseases look the same clinically, they are very different at the molecular level, and these molecular features appear to more accurately predict how well the disease will respond to specific therapies.
This changes how we treat patients, and it allows us to identify treatments that are more likely to be successful.
Accelerating Precision Medicine
Our ability to translate dramatic advances in our understanding of the molecular pathology of digestive diseases into clinical care has been slowed or blocked by a lack of high-quality, clinically annotated patient samples.
To address this deficit in critical research knowledge, the division, led by Dr. William Grady, has established the Gastrointestinal Biorepository and Patient Registry.
The Biorepository and Registry form a highly valuable research core that actively collects tissue samples and health information from prospectively consented patients. These patients have agreed to allow access to their health data and donate biosamples to advance science and ultimately improve our ability to care for patients.
Collected biospecimens are processed using strict, state-of-the-art protocols that ensure their long-term viability and future utility in discovery science.
Advancing Cutting Edge Studies of Gastrointestinal Disease & Health
Because the biospecimens reveal information about both the biology of the patient and the disease, it is critical to know as much as possible about our patients and their specific diseases.
Well annotated specimens --the who, what, when, and where of each specific specimen—are a unique and essential aspect the of the Registry that makes it extremely valuable for translational research.
Because it takes many years to collect enough samples that have a particular characteristic, it is often not possible to do such research without a biorepository as it would take 5-10 years to collect enough samples to even begin a study.
By having an existing biorepository, research is accelerated by 5-10 years. More importantly, research that could not be done before biorepositories existed can now take place. This type of resource is often critical for getting NIH grant support in an era of hyper-competition for funding.
The Registry serves as a bridge between the collected biosamples and each patient's health data.
The well-annotated samples in the UW biorepository have in-depth and highly detailed demographics, precise and meticulous clinical notations, exhaustive treatment history, and accurately recorded disease information.
This data is critical for being able to do translational research that connects studies done in the laboratory with patients and their illnesses.
Translational research is what leads to new ways of treating patients.
CONTACT & INFO
Learn more about the Biorepository and Patient Registry
Email:
Wynn Burke, MSc
wburke@medicine.washington.edu
giresearch@medicine.washington.edu