We would hereby like to inform you that the CASES protocol has been published in the European Stroke Journal! The publication is available via: https://doi.org/10.1177/23969873251319941.

Scientists from Erasmus MC, Amsterdam UMC and Delft University of Technology will jointly receive four million euros from Health~Holland, Top Sector Life Sciences & Health, on behalf of the Dutch CONTRAST Consortium. This funding will be used to develop new technologies for stroke care. “These are applications that use advanced measuring methods, artificial intelligence and digital twins’, says Theo van Walsum of the Radiology & Nuclear Medicine department, and work package lead of WP10 “Research infrastructure for data management”. These new applications and technologies are desperately needed and will also contribute to better treatment.

For more information, see also: https://www.health-holland.com/program/PPCONTRAST#:~:text=In%20Public%2DPrivate%20CONTRAST%20(COllaboration,characterization%2C%20and%20treatment%20of%20patients

Last week we received news from the American Heart Association that a CONTRAST2 related article published in Stroke, “Endovascular thrombectomy alone for large vessel occlusion: a cost-effectiveness evaluation based on meta-analyses,” is featured on Stroke’s blog, Blogging Stroke.

Blogging Stroke highlights high-impact studies published in Stroke. In addition to article summaries, Blogging Stroke includes interviews with authors of recently published Stroke articles and keeps a pulse on the latest happenings in the stroke field through coverage of conferences, including the European Stroke Organisation Conference and the International Stroke Conference. Blog posts are written primarily by a group of stroke fellows and other early career researchers, and thus the blog fosters the involvement of the younger members of the stroke community with the journal and the American Heart Association/American Stroke Association.

The posts could help clinicians take care of patients and researchers think of new projects. Through the blog, the American Hearth Association wants to engage current Stroke readers, as well as medical students, residents, and fellows interested in cerebrovascular disease; in other words, the future leaders of the field of stroke.

To view the blog post, please visit: https://www.ahajournals.org/do/10.1161/blog.20250103.349556

Dec 2024

Afgelopen maand is de 150e patiënt geïncludeerd in de DIST (Dutch ICH Surgery TRIAL), wat betekent dat ze over de 25% van het beoogd aantal studiedeelnemers zitten!
Een mooie prestatie van dit hard werkende team! Gefeliciteerd!

Last month, the 150th patient was included in the DIST (Dutch ICH Surgery TRIAL), which means they included over 25% of the study participants! A beautiful achievement from this hard working team! Congratulations!

On Thursday October 3rd, the CONTRAST2 young talents gathered in Utrecht for an educational afternoon program including a presentation on valorisation and a workshop on time management. After this intellectual endeavour they were rewarded with a nice pizza and drinks.
It was great to see so many of our hard-working PhD students coming together to share knowledge and spend time together.

In September, in Lancet Neurology, a paper is published discussing the results of the 2-year follow up of the MR CLEAN LATE study.
We want to congratulate all authors with this publication!

Collateral-based selection for endovascular treatment of acute ischaemic stroke in the late window (MR CLEAN-LATE): 2-year follow-up of a phase 3, multicentre, open-label, randomised controlled trial in the Netherlands.

Huijberts I, Pinckaers FME, Olthuis SGH, van Kuijk SMJ, Postma AA, Boogaarts HD, Roos YBWEM, Majoie CBLM, van der Lugt A, Dippel DWJ, van Zwam WH, van Oostenbrugge RJ; MR CLEAN-LATE investigators.Lancet Neurol. 2024 Sep;23(9):893-900

Multiple people within our CONTRAST network will soon defend their thesis:

On Friday September 27th, at 16:00 in the Agnietenkapel in Amsterdam, Natalie LeCouffe, who performed work on the de MR CLEAN NO IV, will defend her thesis ‘Refining Endovascular Treatment for Acute Ischemic Stroke’.

On September 30th in Nijmegen, Lotte Sondag (PhD student and coordinating researcher of the DIST pilot study) will defend her thesis entitled ‘Towards new acute treatments for spontaneous intracerebral hemorrhages: The role of surgery and perihematomal edema’.

On October 1st, at 14:15, in the academiegebouw in Utrecht, Bart Franx, working within WP1, will defend his thesis on “Translational Neuroimaging of Cerebral Perfusion after Acute Ischemic Stroke”

We wish them all best of luck!

Hora est.

July 2024

In May, we opened the first round of the CONTRAST2 Young Talent Travel Grants, which gives young CONTRAST researchers the opportunity to go abroad for two months to establish a collaboration.

We received many excellent applications, which were carefully evaluated. Based on the available budget for this call, we were able to fund three projects.

We congratulate Abel Sandmann, Bart Franx and Shan Sui Nio on their grants and look forward to seeing the results of their projects.

Next year in May, we will open another call for these Young Talent Travel Grants and encourage all young researchers with an idea for a project to submit their proposal.