New PhD-student with OPEN affiliation

Trine Maria Mejnert Jørgensen became MD and physician in 2009. After the end of her studies she worked at the Acute Department, Kolding Hospital and in general practice. Subsequently Trine got an introductory position at the Department for Vascular Surgery, Kolding Hospital, where she now is completing her main edducation. March 1th 2012 Trine began her PhD-studies also at the Department of Vascular Surgery, Kolding, as a PhD-student Trines main affiliation to the University of Southern Denmark is at the Institute of Regional Health Services Research, she is also affiliated with OPEN. Trine is familiar with OPEN through a temporary position at the Department for Clinical Biochemistry, Odense University Hospital where she work for 5 month during her medical studies. Her work during this period was mainly related to research. 

 

Familiar abdominal aortic aneurysm - a national case-control study

Background

The risk of abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) is considerably increased among first degree relatives to AAA-patients, early studies are few and hard to compare because of the difference in the difinition and the execution of these studies. Moreover the size of the material, especially for female AAA-patients have made it hard to draw any conclusions concerning this group of patients. Furthermore it has not been possible to clarify whether the familiar cases of AAA are more aggressive than the non-familiar cases and therefore we know very little of the prognosis for ruptur, the age of the patient when surgery takes place or the age of onset in this group.

Aim

The objective of this project is to clarify the following:

• Is the occurrence of AAA increased nationally among parents, brothers, sisters and children of AAA-patients? Main focus on gender differences.
• Is familiar cases of AAA more aggressive in terms of a lower average age at the time of diagnosis, rapid rate of growth and a higher risk of ruptur than among non-familiar AAA-patients?
• Does familiar cases of AAA have a higher occurrence of ruptur, surgery and AAA related cause of death than non-familiar AAA-patients?

Method

• Extraction from existing databases, CPR-registry, National Patient Registry, The Registry for Course of Death and patient journals. Furthermore for identification of the confounders, the IDA-database (the Integrated Database for Labour Market Research), Statistics Denmark (education, profession, social and economic status) and The Danish Medicine Registry.

• The AAA-growth database, whish is established for this project. In the Central Denmark Region and the Region of Southern Denmark standard patient journal reviews will be carried out, in order to describe the rate of growth from the descriptions of medical images on all patients, whom have at least two scans within a period of 6 month.

Project participants

• Vascular Surgery Center, Kolding Hospital, Institute of Regional Health Services Research
  • MD, PhD-student Trine M. M. Jørgensen
  • Staff Specialist, Associated Professor, Main Supervisor Kim C. Houlind

• Vascular Surgery Research Unit, Viborg Hospital
  • Professor, Senior Hospital Physician, Supervisor Jes S. Lindholt
    
    
• OPEN Odense Patient data Exploratory Network, Odense University Hospital and University of Southern Denmark
  • Professor, Senior Hospital Physician, Method Supervisor Anders Green