Researchers from the Medical Faculty of the University of Duisburg-Essen have started the RAPID project together with colleagues from the University Medical Center Greifswald and other university hospitals. The project is part of the University Medicine Network (NUM) and aims to establish a nationwide register in which routine data from adult and paediatric intensive care medicine will be brought together centrally for the first time. This should make research, quality improvement and crisis management much easier.

RAPID stands for “Registry of Adult and Pediatric Intensive Care Data”. The register makes it possible to collect intensive care data from all over Germany automatically and almost nationwide. PD Dr. Nora Bruns from the Department of Paediatrics I at Essen University Hospital and Prof. Dr. Falk von Dincklage from the University Medical Center Greifswald are jointly leading the project. Especially in pediatric intensive care, there has been a lack of reliable data to reliably measure and improve treatment quality, Bruns explains

The data remains stored locally at the respective clinic locations and is retrieved from the intensive care information systems in a federated manner via standardised interfaces – without additional manual documentation. This creates a comprehensive, up-to-date picture of intensive care in Germany.

A central focus is on quality measurement. The scientists are investigating how established indicators – such as the length of stay in hospital – are related to treatment outcomes. Such analyses enable comparisons between clinics and help to identify best practice approaches. The register is also intended to identify developments at an early stage and allow resources to be used in a more targeted manner in crisis situations.

In the third funding phase of the NUM, the project is being supported by the German Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space with a total of around 2.8 million euros over almost three years. Of this, the team in Essen will receive about 330,000 euros.

For the first time, the University Medicine Network (NUM) unites all 37 German university medical sites for large-scale interdisciplinary clinical research projects. Originally founded to coordinate COVID-19 research, the NUM has now established specialized infrastructures for the joint collection and use of complex medical data in everyday clinical practice.

Further information:

RAPID | Network University Medicine

Editor: X-Press Journalistenbüro GbR

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