Development of a Prospective Cardiovascular Patient Cohort and Biobank and Provision of Genomic Analyses With Focus on Platelet Function and Platelet Mediated Inflammatory Processes

Molecular targets on platelets are pivotal for the development of new pharmacological substrates for platelet inhibition and to better understand the impact of platelet-mediated inflammatory processes for the progression of heart disease, such as coronary heart disease and chronic heart failure. Previous investigations on the thienopyridine Clopidogrel have underlined the importance of combined risk factor analysis. Thus, clopidogrel´s prognostic efficacy relies on the combination of genetic factors (mainly polymorphisms of CYP2C19 encoding genes) and non-genetic factors, such as age, diabetes mellitus or concomitant drugs. Therefore, a prospective patient cohort with exact phenotypic characterisation according to standardized protocols is necessary to enable the examination of the clinical relevance of potential molecular targets. A supplementary provision of high quality bio-material enables the systematic examination of new promising platelet-biomarkers in cardiovascular disease, which already have produced significant results on experimental animal and/or cell biologic models. Primary objective of the central project is to establish a prospective cardiological cohort in the setting of a Cardiovascular Clinical Research Unit (CCRU) with an affiliated Biobank and thus to review the clinical significance of potential targets deriving from individual subprojects within the research group (German Research Council KFO 274/1-1) to safeguard a translational approach.