The goal of personalized medicine is to provide patients with tailored treatment. Comprehensive molecular genetic examinations make it possible to identify the causes and treatment options for tumor diseases. Since 2019, the Center for Personalized Medicine (ZPM) at Heidelberg University Hospital (UKHD) has been pooling all expertise relating to this approach, also known as genomic medicine. By sequencing the genome of cancer cells, the experts at the ZPM identify genetic changes that can offer treatment options even in advanced tumor diseases.

Personalized diagnostics and therapy soon also possible for other diseases

In cancer medicine, more and more drugs and treatment concepts are becoming available to find a therapy that is tailored to the molecular characteristics of the tumor. The ZPM in Heidelberg therefore particularly supports the services of the National Center for Tumor Diseases (NCT) Heidelberg in the field of personalized cancer medicine. "Together with the NCT Heidelberg, the ZPM Heidelberg has been offering quality-assured personalized diagnostics and care for advanced and rare tumor diseases for years, which go far beyond guideline-based care. We are currently in the process of extending these analyses to severe chronic inflammatory diseases in order to open up better treatment options for these patients in the future," says Professor Peter Schirmacher, spokesperson for the ZPM Heidelberg and Managing Director of the Institute of Pathology at Heidelberg University Hospital.

Uniform quality standards for all centers

With the certificate from the German Cancer Society (DKG), Heidelberg fulfills the nationwide uniform quality criteria that the specialist society has established for oncology centers. The standards are continuously monitored using a quality management system. The Managing Directors of the Heidelberg ZPM are Professor Dr. Dr. Jürgen Debus, Professor Dr. Alexander Enk, Professor Dr. Stefan Fröhling, Professor Dr. Peter Schirmacher and Professor Dr. Carsten Müller-Tidow.

The Centres for Personalized Medicine were established in 2019 at the four university sites in Baden-Württemberg (Heidelberg, Freiburg, Tübingen, Ulm) and have been extended to all university cancer centers nationwide since 2021 in the "DNPM - German Network for Personalized Medicine". Thanks to the close networking between the ZPMs, all centers benefit equally from the data collected and can use the findings for research and patient care.

The German Cancer Society

The German Cancer Society (DKG) - a successor organization to the "Comité für Krebssammelforschung" founded in 1900 - is the largest scientific oncological society in the German-speaking world. The approximately 8,100 individual members in 25 working groups, the 16 regional cancer societies and 35 supporting members are active in the research and treatment of cancer. The DKG is committed to cancer care based on evidence-based medicine, interdisciplinarity and consistent quality standards, is a co-initiator of the National Cancer Plan and a partner of the "National Decade Against Cancer". The first DKG-certified Centers for Personalized Medicine (ZPM) were the University Medical Center Freiburg and the Charité in Berlin, followed by other university hospitals including the UKHD.