Social Innovation in Health: they develop regional solutions to global problems - the counter

The Universidad Austral de Chile (UACH) is one of the institutions that has a high rate of award of projects of the Innovation Fund for Regional Competitiveness (FIC), with initiatives both in the Los Ríos, Los Lagos, Aysén and others regionPoints of the country.To this is added the successful award in other funds that tend to research linked to innovation and development, such as FONDEF, for example.

Regarding the investigations around the Covid-19 Pandemia, the institution awarded projects of the Ministry of Science, and Innovation, special regional funds and funds from the National Research and Development Agency;It is also part of alliances with other institutions for research and monitoring, such as studies that seek to sequence the DNA of the SAR-COV2 virus, where it participates through Austral-Anomics and all the work done by the Biotechnology Laboratory with theAlpacas antibody.

Although the issue of COVID-19 and the search for solutions for pandemic, from various points of view, has monopolized the attention of the entire country, from the UACH, researchers advance with their innovation projects in other areas of thehealth, focusing on solutions to complex problems, especially in cancer -related diseases and nephropathies.

Gemini

The development of unique analysis software in Latin America, which allows identifyComputer science for nephropathies, executed thanks to the financing of the Innovation Fund for Competitiveness (FIC) of the Regional Government of Los Ríos and its Regional Council.The project is led by the academic JorgeMaturana, from the Faculty of Engineering Sciences, together with Claudio Flores, of the Faculty of Medicine.

“Currently, it is not possible to identify the genetic cause of automantic autamanic renal polycystosis in South America.Having the possibility of doing so in our country, and being - we hope, in the not very distant future - financed from Fonasa, will open the possibility of diagnosis to many people in Chile affected by this disease, ”says the DR.Maturana.

For a patient, identifying a living kidney donor from his family, will increase the chances of being successfully transplanted, and with that they normally resume his life, producing a substantial improvement both emotional and economic for his family group for his family group.Additionally, since the dialysis treatment is currently funded by the State, taking patients from this condition will mean savings for the National Health Budget, taking into account that the cost of implementing this technique is much lower, ”he adds.

The project is one month after ending formally, but there are linked initiatives planned for the next decade, which involve the application of the techniques developed to other diseases, complementing it with other types of diagnosis, and linking with the academy to train professionals in This line.

In parallel, protocols are being developed to perform this analysis in laboratories of the Valdivia Base Hospital and performing efforts with the Ministry of Health to be incorporated as an accessible benefit for affected patients.

Personalized medicine against cancer

The OncotdM project seeks to customize the dose of drugs that are used in cancer treatment, with the potential to significantly improve clinical results in patients, maximizing the effectiveness of the drug and minimizing toxicity.This, without a doubt, is aligned with the precision medicine of the future and allows to make available to the medical community and patients, an extremely useful tool, which recognizes each patient as a completely different individual from the other and seeks to make the process of useof the drug a profitable, safe and rational experience, maximizing the use of high -risk therapies.In addition to this, it contributes to an efficient use of economic resources for the health center and/or patients.

This research seeks to generate a public good that combines pharmaceutical, analytical and medical competences, developmental methodologies in the region and the country to measure blood levels of chemotherapeutics, in a physical space conditioned with the necessary technology for the subsequent development of other techniques thatallow quantifying any antineoplastic drug and others.

The director of this FIC-R and Academic project of the UACH Faculty of Sciences, Daniel Muñoz, comments that “this initiative is between 70-80% executed, with more than 40 patients benefited to the date, between both drugs involved inThe study, with the bulk of fully settled analytical and clinical activities and in the process of transfer of the product developed towards the public institution benefited, in this case the Valdivia Base Hospital ".

Likewise, "future lines of work of the team are being defined, prioritizing the development of a precise dose service for drugs with high clinical and socio-sanitary impact, as well as the ways of approaching it towards the regional and national community,through financing mechanisms via Fonasa or Agreement with private ”.

Equity and efficiency in organ transplantation in Macrored Sur Austral

During the years 2018 and 2019 thanks to the award of a FIC project of the Regional Government of Los Ríos, the construction, implementation and update of the Valdivia Histocompatibility Laboratory was carried out.

This was carried out through a health care agreement between the Valdivia Health Service and the Austral University of Chile, under the required quality standards, with the latest generation equipment.

This facilitated the obtaining of quality certification in two of its four main areas of activities: detection and identification of anti-Hla and HLA SSP antibodies, which generated an increase of about 60% in patient coverage, the patient coverage, thedecrease of one month in response times, the generation of controlled reports and the update of all pending pre-transplant studies with the consequent benefit for patients in the southern Southern zone.

Alejandra Droguett, director of the Histocompatibility Laboratory of the Valdivia Base Hospital, which is at the same time academic of the UACH Faculty of Medicine, leads the FIC project, financed by the Innovation Fund for Competitiveness (FIC) of the Regional Government of Los Ríos andIts regional council, “implementation of a state -of -the -art system for specific receptor selection in patients from the National Transplant Program belonging to the Los Ríos Region and Macrored Sur Southern Austral of the country”.

This project starts new procedures, which approve the technical and immunological specifications used by the ISP for the rest of the patients nationwide, both for renal transplant and bone marrows, decreasing the waiting time for the entrance to the program and selectingThe most appropriate receiver for transplantation in our area, avoiding the difficulties of transferring patients, sending samples and organs to Santiago, materializing the transplant with the least possible risk.

The direct beneficiaries with this implementation are around 400 patients from 28 dialysis centers in the Araucanía region to Magallanes and 60 patients with leukemia and their relatives with the possibility of being bone marrow donors.More than 200 potential beneficiaries and 2.5 million indirect beneficiaries.

Bone marrow transplantation

The project “Improvement of the Hematopoietic Progenitors Transplant Unit of the Valdivia Base Hospital” is executed by the Universidad Austral de Chile and funded by the Innovation Fund for Competitiveness (FIC) of the Regional Government of Los Ríos and its Regional Council, withUACH contributions and Valdivia Base Hospital.

The initiative aims to expand and ensure access to bone marrow transplant.With this, it seeks to ensure timely access to high complexity treatment to a lower cost and with quality standards similar to those of the private system, which is usually the only survival option.

“We are very satisfied with the social impact of the project, which is in its last stage.It is important to underline that in 2018 the Valdivia Base Hospital made 9 autologous transplants in adults.During 2019, 19 procedures were carried out and the most remarkable, is that, despite the pandemic, during 2020 19 procedures were also carried out and so far this year, 12 transplants have been developed.The remarkable increase in procedures is due, in the first place, that thanks to the FIC project, in 2019, a new isolation room was enabled that bears the name of prominent teacher and father of Valdivian hematology, Dr.Álvaro León, ”says the project director and academic at the UACH Faculty of Medicine, Vivianne Torres.

This room has an entrance lock to separate the clean environment from the dirty, it has no corner, but rounded edges and washable walls and has a filtering, pressurization and air conditioning system in order to guarantee a clean area to patients who do not havesufficient defenses and can contract any fungus that circulates in their surroundings.

Regional research for gallbladder cancer

“Our project addresses a problem that mainly afflicts the river region, gallbladder cancer.The incidence and mortality rates of this cancer are the highest worldwide in this region, and affect women, ”says ClaudiaQuezada, academic of the UACH Faculty of Sciences and director of the FIC" Biomarker project in cancerof gallbladder ".

The causes of gallbladder cancer and its strong incidence in the southern part of Chile have been associated with the appearance of bile calculations and the Mapuche descent.Thus, this disease has a strong nutritional and genetic component that seems to be more accentuated in regions such as Araucanía, Ríos, Lagos and Aysén.

"Despite all this, very little of this cancer is known in terms of diagnosis, monitoring and treatments, since it is not a frequent neoplasia in developed countries or in other regions of the country, which strongly impacts investment for its investment for itsresearch ”, explains.

For the researcher, having few studies in this regard, the funds such as those granted by the Innovation Fund for Competitiveness (FIC) of the Regional Government of Los Ríos and their Regional Council, and the support of institutions such as the Valdivia Base Hospital andThe Millennium Institute of Immunology and Immunotherapy (IMII), are fundamental to take care of a health and social problem that particularly affects us.

This initiative seeks to determine markers with potential prognosis and predictive in tumor samples of patients with gallbladder cancer, which have been collected for more than 10 years at the Valdivia Base Hospital.Therefore, these markers will not only help monitor the course of the disease (such as patient survival), but will also lay the bases to start trying new medium -term therapies.

“On the one hand, as a molecular pathology laboratory we have specialized in the study of drug resistance markers, so part of this initiative would be aimed at improving chemotherapy strategies for patients.On the other hand, our collaborating entity, the IMII, has a recognized trajectory in the study and implementation of immunotherapy in other types of cancer, so we intend to address this disease from two therapeutic approaches, "says Dra.Quezada.

Our project also seeks to have a informative impact, since the risk factors associated with this cancer, such as cholelithiasis (bile calculations) and diabetes, have a strong food base, so it is extremely necessary to boost prevention programs.In short, the most relevant social impact of this work is summarized in improving the quality of life of patients with gallbladder cancer, as well as informing about the causes and possibilities of preventing it ”

“To date, we have managed to establish a panel of chemist and immunological markers that will allow us to design during this year a bioinformatics tool for clinical use that supports the prognosis of the disease.Likewise, part of the information that these markers have given us will serve to begin designing new therapeutic strategies based on chemotherapy and immunotherapy, an objective that we intend to propose in a next FIC project.The idea is that within 3 or 4 years we start to implement these new treatment strategies in the region, in addition to supporting the clinical monitoring of this cancer, ”says the researcher.

Vigiacovid

Claudio Verdugo, Director Vigiacovid Program and Academic of the Institute of Animal Pathology of the Faculty of Veterinary Sciences, indicates that “from the beginning our idea was to generate a method that was able to deliver a little more normality to the life of people.That, through a cheaper and easy to apply strategy, the highest risk groups can be constantly monitoring to avoid outbreaks ".

"The experience with the public sector gave way to private and other organizations to recognize the importance of epidemiological surveillance programs, being used in different sectors as an adequate preventive strategy, which helps the economic reactivation of sectors that have been reduced by thePandemia, "he says.

The impact on collective locomotion has also been significant, according to the administrator of Line 20 of Microbuses, Pablo Pizarro: “It is very positive and in our staff there was a lot of interest in the exam.It gives us a lot of peace of mind that the university constantly monitors us, since our guild is very exposed.While we follow all the regulations to work, one never knows ".

For the manager of Asenav, Heinz Pearce, the benefit of this program is “to protect the health of our workers and that of their families, which helps to maintain their work and support source, great tranquility in these times of greatwork uncertainty and economic difficulties in which our country is going through ”.

"Maintaining the company underway allows us to comply with our contractual commitments for the construction of new ships, thereby fulfilling all financial obligations and maintaining the use of our people," concludes.