The Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) has announced funding for nine clinical trials in a joint programme established in 2003 by the DFG and the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). This decision was reached by the DFG's Joint Committee at its meeting on 2 September 2005. The programme's objective is the long-term sustainable improvement of patient-oriented clinical research in Germany. This will foster the expertise of German university hospitals in terms of planning and carrying out clinical trials, helping to ensure its establishment on a broad basis.

Whereas the DFG will primarily fund diagnostic and non-pharmacological therapeutic procedures, the BMBF, which is funding eight additional clinical trials, will focus more on pharmacological therapeutic procedures. The DFG and the BMBF will each initially provide annual programme funding of 5 million until 2008.

The nine clinical trials to be funded by the DFG are as follows:

The clinical trial Spiral CT Scanning for the Early Detection of Lung Cancer; Randomized Controlled Screening Trial of Multidetector Spiral CT Scanning in Germany" at the German Cancer Research Center in Heidelberg is part of an international study being carried out in Europe. Its objective is to improve the assessment of the benefits of annual screening by means of multidetector spiral CT, or MSCT, for patients with an increased risk of lung cancer. In Germany over 42,000 people are diagnosed with lung cancer each year, primarily smokers.
(Total funding: 651,911. Coordinator: Prof. Nikolaus Becker, German Cancer Research Center, Heidelberg)

Patients with cirrhosis of the liver tend to suffer from vasodilation, such as varicose veins in the oesophagus and the stomach. The most frequent cause of death is blood vessel haemorrhaging. However, conventional measures for controlling this risk of variceal bleeding also represent numerous risks. The clinical
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Contact: Dr. Eva-Maria Streier
em.streier@dfg.de
49-228-885-2250
Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
13-Sep-2005

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