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Introduction: The German PID-NET registry was founded in 2009, serving as the first national registry of patients with primary immunodeficiencies (PID) in Germany. It is part of the European Society for Immunodeficiencies (ESID) registry. The primary purpose of the registry is to gather data on the epidemiology, diagnostic delay, diagnosis, and treatment of PIDs.
Methods: Clinical and laboratory data was collected from 2,453 patients from 36 German PID centres in an online registry. Data was analysed with the software Stata® and Excel.
Results: The minimum prevalence of PID in Germany is 2.72 per 100,000 inhabitants. Among patients aged 1–25, there was a clear predominance of males. The median age of living patients ranged between 7 and 40 years, depending on the respective PID. Predominantly antibody disorders were the most prevalent group with 57% of all 2,453 PID patients (including 728 CVID patients). A gene defect was identified in 36% of patients. Familial cases were observed in 21% of patients. The age of onset for presenting symptoms ranged from birth to late adulthood (range 0–88 years). Presenting symptoms comprised infections (74%) and immune dysregulation (22%). Ninety-three patients were diagnosed without prior clinical symptoms. Regarding the general and clinical diagnostic delay, no PID had undergone a slight decrease within the last decade. However, both, SCID and hyper IgE- syndrome showed a substantial improvement in shortening the time between onset of symptoms and genetic diagnosis. Regarding treatment, 49% of all patients received immunoglobulin G (IgG) substitution (70%—subcutaneous; 29%—intravenous; 1%—unknown). Three-hundred patients underwent at least one hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT). Five patients had gene therapy.
Conclusion: The German PID-NET registry is a precious tool for physicians, researchers, the pharmaceutical industry, politicians, and ultimately the patients, for whom the outcomes will eventually lead to a more timely diagnosis and better treatment.
Chordomas are rare bone tumors with few therapeutic options. Here we show, using whole-exome and genome sequencing within a precision oncology program, that advanced chordomas (n = 11) may be characterized by genomic patterns indicative of defective homologous recombination (HR) DNA repair and alterations affecting HR-related genes, including, for example, deletions and pathogenic germline variants of BRCA2, NBN, and CHEK2. A mutational signature associated with HR deficiency was significantly enriched in 72.7% of samples and co-occurred with genomic instability. The poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) inhibitor olaparib, which is preferentially toxic to HR-incompetent cells, led to prolonged clinical benefit in a patient with refractory chordoma, and whole-genome analysis at progression revealed a PARP1 p.T910A mutation predicted to disrupt the autoinhibitory PARP1 helical domain. These findings uncover a therapeutic opportunity in chordoma that warrants further exploration, and provide insight into the mechanisms underlying PARP inhibitor resistance.
Background: To evaluate clinical outcomes after either immediate or deferred initiation of antiretroviral therapy in HIV-1-infected patients, presenting late with pneumocystis pneumonia (PCP) or toxoplasma encephalitis (TE).
Methods: Phase IV, multicenter, prospective, randomized open-label clinical trial. Patients were randomized into an immediate therapy arm (starting antiretroviral therapy (ART) within 7 days after initiation of OI treatment) versus a deferred arm (starting ART after completing the OI-therapy). All patients were followed for 24 weeks. The rates of clinical progression (death, new or relapsing opportunistic infections (OI) and other grade 4 clinical endpoints) were compared, using a combined primary endpoint. Secondary endpoints were hospitalization rates after completion of OI treatment, incidence of immune reconstitution inflammatory syndrome (IRIS), virologic and immunological outcome, adherence to proteinase-inhibitor based antiretroviral therapy (ART) protocol and quality of life.
Results: 61 patients (11 patients suffering TE, 50 with PCP) were enrolled. No differences between the two therapy groups in all examined primary and secondary endpoints could be identified: immunological and virologic outcome was similar in both groups, there was no significant difference in the incidence of IRIS (11 and 10 cases), furthermore 9 events (combined endpoint of death, new/relapsing OI and grade 4 events) occurred in each group.
Conclusions: In summary, this study supports the notion that immediate initiation of ART with a ritonavir-boosted proteinase-inhibitor and two nucleoside reverse transcriptase inhibitors is safe and has no negative effects on incidence of disease progression or IRIS, nor on immunological and virologic outcomes or on quality of life.
Replacement therapy in severe hemophilia A leads to factor VIII (FVIII) inhibitors in 30% of patients. Factor VIII gene (F8) mutation type, a family history of inhibitors, ethnicity and intensity of treatment are established risk factors, and were included in two published prediction tools based on regression models. Recently investigated immune regulatory genes could also play a part in immunogenicity. Our objective is to identify bio-clinical and genetic markers for FVIII inhibitor development, taking into account potential genetic high order interactions. The study population consisted of 593 and 79 patients with hemophilia A from centers in Bonn and Frankfurt respectively. Data was collected in the European ABIRISK tranSMART database. A subset of 125 severely affected patients from Bonn with reliable information on first treatment was selected as eligible for risk stratification using a hybrid tree-based regression model (GPLTR). In the eligible subset, 58 (46%) patients developed FVIII inhibitors. Among them, 49 (84%) were “high risk” F8 mutation type. 19 (33%) had a family history of inhibitors. The GPLTR model, taking into account F8 mutation risk, family history of inhibitors and product type, distinguishes two groups of patients: a high-risk group for immunogenicity, including patients with positive HLA-DRB1*15 and genotype G/A and A/A for IL-10 rs1800896, and a low-risk group of patients with negative HLA-DRB1*15 / HLA-DQB1*02 and T/T or G/T for CD86 rs2681401. We show associations between genetic factors and the occurrence of FVIII inhibitor development in severe hemophilia A patients taking into account for high-order interactions using a generalized partially linear tree-based approach.
We present first data on sub-threshold production of Ks0 mesons and Λ hyperons in Au+Au collisions at sNN=2.4 GeV. We observe an universal 〈Apart〉 scaling of hadrons containing strangeness, independent of their corresponding production thresholds. Comparing the yields, their 〈Apart〉 scaling, and the shapes of the rapidity and the pt spectra to state-of-the-art transport model (UrQMD, HSD, IQMD) predictions, we find that none of them can simultaneously describe these observables with reasonable χ2 values.
We investigate identical pion HBT intensity interferometry in central Au+Au collisions at 1.23A GeV. High-statistics π−π− and π+π+ data are measured with HADES at SIS18/GSI. The radius parameters, derived from the correlation function depending on relative momenta in the longitudinally comoving system and parametrized as three-dimensional Gaussian distribution, are studied as function of transverse momentum. A substantial charge-sign difference of the source radii is found, particularly pronounced at low transverse momentum. The extracted source parameters agree well with a smooth extrapolation of the center-of-mass energy dependence established at higher energies, extending the corresponding excitation functions down towards a very low energy.