Projects / Programmes
Precision Medicine Approach to Cell Therapy in Heart Failure
| Code |
Science |
Field |
Subfield |
| 3.06.00 |
Medical sciences |
Cardiovascular system |
|
| Code |
Science |
Field |
| 3.02 |
Medical and Health Sciences |
Clinical medicine |
stem cells; heart failure; precision medicine
Data for the last 5 years (citations for the last 10 years) on
April 24, 2024;
A3 for period
2018-2022
Data for ARIS tenders (
04.04.2019 – Programme tender,
archive
)
| Database |
Linked records |
Citations |
Pure citations |
Average pure citations |
| WoS |
437 |
8,844 |
8,281 |
18.95 |
| Scopus |
456 |
11,526 |
10,773 |
23.63 |
Researchers (12)
| no. |
Code |
Name and surname |
Research area |
Role |
Period |
No. of publicationsNo. of publications |
| 1. |
32516 |
Vesna Andročec |
|
Technical associate |
2021 - 2024 |
58 |
| 2. |
37394 |
Andraž Cerar |
Cardiovascular system |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
138 |
| 3. |
31049 |
PhD Erik Dovgan |
Computer science and informatics |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
143 |
| 4. |
24039 |
PhD Sabina Frljak |
Cardiovascular system |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
117 |
| 5. |
08501 |
PhD Matjaž Gams |
Computer science and informatics |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
1,690 |
| 6. |
29523 |
PhD Anton Gradišek |
Physics |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
436 |
| 7. |
32517 |
PhD Renata Okrajšek |
Cardiovascular system |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
103 |
| 8. |
28021 |
PhD Gregor Poglajen |
Cardiovascular system |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
331 |
| 9. |
19345 |
PhD Miran Šebeštjen |
Cardiovascular system |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
270 |
| 10. |
18826 |
PhD Bojan Vrtovec |
Medical sciences |
Head |
2021 - 2024 |
486 |
| 11. |
37784 |
PhD Gregor Zemljič |
Medical sciences |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
123 |
| 12. |
54242 |
Neža Žorž |
Cardiovascular system |
Researcher |
2021 - 2024 |
20 |
Organisations (2)
Abstract
Background. Despite significant advances in medical and device therapy over the past decades, chronic heart failure represents an increasingly common and debilitating disorder with poor prognosis and high early and late mortality rates. Although the accumulated clinical evidence suggests that cell therapy may be beneficial in different subpopulations of heart failure patients, the results of clinical trials are inconsistent, which makes it difficult to translate the research findings into everyday clinical practice. Objectives. The overall goal of the project is to develop a personalized cell therapy approach to be used as a standard clinical management in a broad population of patients with chronic heart failure. Specifically, the primary objective of the project is to define optimal patient selection criteria, and the secondary objective is to better define the effects of cell dose, cell type, and cell delivery techniques on the efficacy of cell therapy. Methods. The work plan consists of 2WPs. In WP1 we plan to analyze the combined dataset from 6 previous clinical trials conducted by our research group, enrolling patients with chronic heart failure who were treated with cell therapy. By implementation of artificial intelligence analysis on this dataset we aim to define individual patient profiles that will most likely benefit from cell therapy. Artificial intelligence analysis will be based on the analysis of the patient Holistic Health Records. Classification models and clustering models to assess how patients respond to treatment will be based on classical machine learning and various types of neural networks. Patient responder profiles derived in WP1 will then be validated in a prospective randomized clinical trial in WP2. The study protocol will consist of a prospective, randomized double blind, placebo-controlled design. We will enroll 30 patients with heart failure. After enrollment, all patients will receive 5-day stem cell mobilization with G-CSF. Thereafter, patients will be randomly allocated to either active (SC Group) or control group (Controls) in a 2:1 ratio. Patients in the SC Group will undergo apheresis; CD34+ cells will be collected with immunomagnetic selection, and delivered transendocardialy in the target areas defined by electroanatomical mapping. In the Controls, no apheresis or immunomagnetic selection of CD34+ cells will be performed; the patients will receive transendocardial injections of placebo using the same electroanatomical mapping protocol as in patients from the SC Group. Patients will be followed for 1 year. At baseline, at 6 months, and at 1 year we will perform comprehensive patient evaluation. All data on patient evaluation will be transferred to a secure central database and will be analyzed using an integration algorithm at the end of the follow-up period. Expected Results. We expect that the results of the project will yield important data on patient selection, stem cell type and dose, and cell delivery techniques, which will optimize the efficacy of cell therapy in chronic heart failure. Based on these data, we will design a web-based application, which will serve as a tool to help physicians to select optimal patients for cell therapy in everyday clinical settings.
