Saunders Stina, Gregory Sarah, Clement Matthew H S, Birck Cindy, van der Geyten Serge, Ritchie Craig W
Edinburgh Dementia Prevention, Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, United Kingdom.
Alzheimer's Disease Data Initiative, Kirkland, WA, United States.
Front Neurol. 2022 Nov 22;13:1051543. doi: 10.3389/fneur.2022.1051543. eCollection 2022.
Tens of millions of people worldwide will develop Alzheimer's disease (AD), and only by intervening early in the preclinical disease can we make a fundamental difference to the rates of late-stage disease where clinical symptoms and societal burden manifest. However, collectively utilizing data, samples, and knowledge amassed by large-scale projects such as the Innovative Medicines Initiative (IMI)-funded European Prevention of Alzheimer's Dementia (EPAD) program will enable the research community to learn, adapt, and implement change.
In the current article, we define and discuss the substantial assets of the EPAD project for the scientific community, patient population, and industry, describe the EPAD structure with a focus on how the public and private sector interacted and collaborated within the project, reflect how IMI specifically supported the achievements of the above, and conclude with a view for future.
The EPAD project was a €64-million investment to facilitate secondary prevention of AD dementia research. The project recruited over 2,000 research participants into the EPAD longitudinal cohort study (LCS) and included over 400 researchers from 39 partners. The EPAD LCS data and biobank are freely available and easily accessible the Alzheimer's Disease Data Initiative's (ADDI) AD Workbench platform and the University of Edinburgh's Sample Access Committee. The trial delivery network established within the EPAD program is being incorporated into the truly global offering from the Global Alzheimer's Platform (GAP) for trial delivery, and the almost 100 early-career researchers who were part of the EPAD Academy will take forward their experience and learning from EPAD to the next stage of their careers.
Through GAP, IMI-Neuronet, and follow-on funding from the Alzheimer's Association for the data and sample access systems, the EPAD assets will be maintained and, as and when sponsors seek a new platform trial to be established, the learnings from EPAD will ensure that this can be developed to be even more successful than this first pan-European attempt.
全球数以千万计的人将会患上阿尔茨海默病（AD），只有在临床前疾病阶段尽早进行干预，我们才能从根本上改变出现临床症状和社会负担的晚期疾病的发病率。然而，整合利用由诸如创新药物计划（IMI）资助的欧洲预防阿尔茨海默病痴呆症（EPAD）项目等大型项目积累的数据、样本和知识，将使研究界能够学习、调整并实施变革。
在本文中，我们定义并讨论了EPAD项目对科学界、患者群体和行业的重要资产，描述了EPAD的结构，重点关注公共和私营部门在项目中的互动与合作方式，阐述IMI如何具体支持上述成果，并对未来进行展望。
EPAD项目投资6400万欧元以促进AD痴呆症的二级预防研究。该项目招募了2000多名研究参与者进入EPAD纵向队列研究（LCS），并包括来自39个合作伙伴的400多名研究人员。EPAD LCS数据和生物样本库可通过阿尔茨海默病数据倡议组织（ADDI）的AD工作台平台和爱丁堡大学的样本获取委员会免费获取且易于访问。在EPAD项目中建立的试验交付网络正被纳入全球阿尔茨海默病平台（GAP）提供的真正全球性的试验交付服务中，并且作为EPAD学院一部分的近100名早期职业研究人员将把他们从EPAD获得的经验和知识带入其职业生涯的下一阶段。
通过GAP、IMI - Neuronet以及阿尔茨海默病协会对数据和样本获取系统的后续资助，EPAD的资产将得以维护，并且当赞助商寻求建立新的平台试验时，EPAD的经验教训将确保其能够发展得比这首次泛欧洲尝试更加成功。
