Research - Unit of Pulmonary hypertension
There are two different sides to research into pulmonary hypertension: clinical research, based on clinical trials investigating new, are effective and less toxic drugs, and basic and translational research, which is carried out in the laboratory and, in our case, allows for the identification of new signalling pathways in the development of PH that may be more appropriate therapeutic targets. In this regard, we not only work at the laboratory level with animal and cell models, but also with patient and tissue samples when the patient undergoes a lung transplant. This basic and translational research is developed at IDIBAPS, in Area 2—Biopathology and Respiratory, Cardiovascular and Renal Bioengineering—in the group led by Dr. Blanco entitled, “Translational research in pulmonary vascular diseases: cell proliferation and apoptotic mechanisms in pulmonary arterial hypertension”.
We have two basic facilities—patient registries and biological repositories—which are already in place and help to facilitate research by providing epidemiological and clinical information and biological samples. We participate in REHAP, which is the Spanish registry of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) that allows for the analysis of the epidemiology of pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) and chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension (CTEPH) in Spain and how it evolves over the years. Moreover, REHAP provides a real and up-to-date view of the therapeutic management of PAH and CTEPH in our country and the short- and medium-term results, both in terms of survival and clinical changes. We are one of the centres with the highest volume of cases. At the same time, we have created the PH Biobank, with blood from patients with PAH or CTEPH, with associated clinical data from the REHAP registry.
In addition, as a reference centre, we participate in multicentre, randomized, placebo-controlled phase 2 and phase 3 clinical trials of new drugs for the treatment of patients with PAH and CTEPH.
The Pulmonary Hypertension Unit at the Hospital Clínic Barcelona is the most active research unit in Spain.