Ecraid brings together Dutch investigators to foster collaboration
Investigators from healthcare institutions across the Netherlands got together in Utrecht to form closer ties and learn more about Ecraid's ambitions. The meeting was part of our efforts to foster collaboration on a national, as well as international level.
On 5 March 2024, Ecraid hosted a meeting of investigators currently participating in our clinical research. Representatives from 11 Dutch institutions got together in Utrecht to get to know each other and the many Ecraid-affiliated studies on infectious diseases that are currently running in the Netherlands. The event marks the beginning of a series of such gatherings intended to facilitate increased national collaboration and engagement.
Among the attendees was Olaf Cremer, a professor of clinical epidemiology of sepsis at UMC Utrecht. He praised the initiative for providing an opportunity to connect with fellow researchers:
“We know each other by name, but we never sit together to share details about the work that we are doing. Meeting like this one make it easier to find opportunities to work together.”
Introducing Ecraid
Ecraid CEO Marc Bonten welcomed everyone with an introduction to Ecraid and its governance structure. He emphasised the inefficiencies of randomised controlled trials and the importance of local and international collaboration and innovative trial designs.
At the heart of Ecraid lies its warm-base network, which includes the hospital network CLIN-Net. Miranda Hopman lauded her team’s role in supporting the participating clinical research sites. She also talked about the Ecraid Clinical Liaison council whose members – local key opinion leaders, stakeholders, and members of the network – provide advice on their countries’ feasibility for any given study, share knowledge on country-specific regulations and potential hurdles, and propose suitable sites and help engage them. At the end of her presentation, Miranda highlighted her team’s focus on providing training to young investigators as a means to fostering the next generation of scientific leaders.
A look at our studies
Various Ecraid studies were represented by the investigators involved. Lennie Derde told the story of REMAP-CAP, a landmark adaptive platform trial which began enrolling COVID-19 patients two days before the World Health Organisation classified the emerging disease as a pandemic. PhD candidate Lisa Hessels talked about the rationale behind the PNEUMO study and the preliminary results, while Marjolein Hensgens and Nynke Jager explained the need for the SNAP trial and the role of collaboration in setting it up.
The final topic of the day were Ecraid’s perpetual observational studies (POSs). Marc Bonten introduced POS-ARI, POS-cUIT, and POS-VAP and showed their patient recruitment progress by way of the interactive graph available here. A fourth POS, POS-Disease X, was presented by Corine Geurts who highlighted the role of innovative designs in biobanking for the future of infectious disease outbreaks.