Medical need
The median survival following lung transplant is very low (5.2 years). Following transplantation, some patients are at risk of severe life-threatening complications, including acute bone marrow or liver failure. We have discovered that patients who are at risk for Short Telomere Syndrome (STS) are also at risk of lung transplant complications and we developed an algorithm to identify these subjects.
Current research
- We are validating the STS diagnostic algorithm and improving its accuracy buy studying other patients.
- We hypothesize that other categories of patients are at higher risk of post-transplant complications. So all patients recruited will undergo whole exome sequencing to compare who developed post-operative complications after 1 year and who did not.
- We hypothesize that increased methylation and reduced telomere length may be useful predictor of accelerated lung function decline or transplant complications. To test this hypothesis all patients recruited will undergo CpG methylation analysis to quantify methylation burden.