NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – The International Serious Adverse Events Consortium (SAEC) today announced it is collaborating with Shanghai Jiao Tong University to research the genetics of drug-induced serious adverse events (SAEs) in Chinese populations.
The goal of the collaboration, which also involves a national network of more than 30 Chinese hospitals, is to increase knowledge of the impact of ethnic diversity on the genetics of SAEs. SAEC is recruiting patients through an international network of academic centers and integrated healthcare systems to study SAEs with a strong immunologic underpinning, SAEC said.
Examples include drug-induced livery injury, drug-induce kidney injury, drug-induced serious skin rashes, and acute hypersensitivity syndrome.
The collaboration will be based out of the SJTU's Bio-X Institute, which studies the genetic and molecular basis of disease and drug response. Lin He and Shengying Qin, respectively a professor and associate professor at the university, will direct the work, the first phase of which is expected to last two years.
"Our genetic research to date points to a strong role of the immune system in a number of our target SAEs," Arthur Holden, chairman of SAEC, said in a statement. "To better understand the full genetic effects contributing to these diseases, we need to develop larger and more diverse collections of subjects. Our collaboration with SJTU and the Bio-X Institute will be an important initiative to help us achieve this research objective."
SAEC was founded in 2007 and is a not-for-profit consortium comprised of drug firms, the US Food and Drug Administration, and global academic institutions. Its focus is on identifying and confirming genetic markers for the prediction of patients at risk for drug-related serious adverse events.