On February 14, 2025, a workshop was held at IDIVAL’s LiNNUX Lab, in collaboration with FISABIO and with the participation of LASINDE.

Under the title “How can we improve healthcare mobility in Cantabria?”, the event brought together healthcare professionals, innovation experts and health service users, who contributed valuable ideas and perspectives on the topic.

The workshop took place from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm, as part of the Join2Procure+ project, an initiative focused on the exchange of experiences in Public Procurement of Innovation (PPI). Throughout the session, participants discussed strategies and practices that could be implemented to improve access to healthcare services, promoting a collaborative approach focused on community needs.

The collaboration between IDIVAL and FISABIO in the field of PPI began in 2023, allowing both institutions to develop joint activities and advance in the implementation of innovative solutions in healthcare management.

Next month, the largest biomedical research project in Cantabria, a pioneering initiative in Spain, will mark four years of progress and is now on the verge of reaching its initial goal of 50,000 participants.

Cantabria Cohort has already surpassed 45,000 volunteers, entering the final stage of its recruitment phase. This major biomedical research project, a first-of-its-kind in Spain, will celebrate its fourth anniversary in April, bringing it closer to its initial goal of enrolling 50,000 participants.

Over the years, the project has made significant advances and incorporated new initiatives. Cantabria Cohort collaborates with multiple scientific teams using participant data and samples to conduct research in diverse areas such as diabetes, cancer, and digestive diseases.

Thanks to its successful reception, Cantabria Cohort will have its own governance starting in 2025 and is receiving full financial support from the Regional Health Department. In this regard, the project’s research team is actively involved in a new initiative led by the General Directorate of Public Health, aimed at developing a strategy to combat childhood obesity in the region.

Other recent additions to Cantabria Cohort include cognitive tests through the online platform CogniFit, a new questionnaire on diseases, feedback surveys to enhance study quality, and global statistics on some of the data collected so far, available on the project’s website.

Additionally, the project coordinators have launched live broadcasts on YouTube, an innovative way to engage with participants, who can ask questions in real time via chat. The coordinators address common inquiries such as “When will follow-ups begin?”, “Why aren’t tests conducted at my health center?”, and “Why haven’t I received my results?” in the latest broadcast, available at the following link: YouTube Live Session.

5,000 More Volunteers Needed, Preferably from Remote Areas

Cantabria Cohort is open to residents of Cantabria aged 40 to 70. The study team contacts eligible individuals daily, but anyone interested can learn more and participate through the project’s website: Cohorte Cantabria.

Although more than 45,000 Cantabrians have already joined the study, Cantabria Cohort is calling for 5,000 additional volunteers, particularly from rural areas far from Santander (Liébana, Campoo-Los Valles, Valles Pasiegos, Asón-Agüera, and the Eastern Coast) and within the 40 to 44 age group.

Currently, women make up 58% of participants, so men are also encouraged to join the study. Preparations are already underway for the follow-up phase, set to begin this year, which may include new tests and questionnaires to collect additional relevant data.

About Cantabria Cohort

Cantabria Cohort is a research project led by the Marqués de Valdecilla Research Institute (IDIVAL), with support from Marqués de Valdecilla University Hospital and the Government of Cantabria. This initiative is building a large biomedical data and sample platform from the Cantabrian population, accessible to researchers across various fields. The studies derived from Cantabria Cohort aim to advance Personalized Medicine, enabling more effective approaches for each patient.

On 27 February, the Marqués de Valdecilla University Hospital will hold an Update Day on Rare Diseases and the Need for a Multiprofessional Approach (360º), a meeting organised by the Hospital’s Internal Medicine, Paediatrics and Genetics Services to commemorate World Day for Rare Diseases.

The event, in collaboration with the University of Cantabria, the Regional Ministry of Health, the Cantabrian Health Service (SCS), IDIVAL and the Centre for Biomedical Research Network on Rare Diseases (CIBERER), will take place from 16:30 hours in the Hospital’s Gómez Durán conference room. Access is free, although for logistical reasons, those interested should send an email to enfrares360@gmail.com before 23 February to confirm attendance.

The Hospital’s medical director, Ramón Herrería, will be in charge of welcoming the participants and giving the first talk of the day, ‘Systematic diseases’, in which experts from Valdecilla and other hospitals in the country will address this topic. Álvaro Hermida, internist from the Complejo Hospitalario Universitario de Santiago de Compostela (CHUS), will speak on Fabry’s disease, and Domingo González-Lamuño, a doctor from the Paediatrics Department of the HUMV, will speak on Aminoacidopathies.

The second round table of the day, ‘New projects’, moderated by Domingo González-Lamuño, will start at 18:00. It will address different initiatives related to Rare Diseases thanks to the presentations of José Luis Fernández Luna, coordinator of the Genetics Service at Valdecilla, who will speak on Genomes in Paediatrics, and Nuria Puente, a doctor from the Internal Medicine Service at Valdecilla, who will give a talk entitled ‘Rare Diseases without Diagnosis’.

At 19:00 the third and last round table of the day will begin, ‘Different perspectives for the same objective’, moderated by the head of the Internal Medicine Section at Valdecilla, José Antonio Riancho. In it, patients and professionals from Cantabria’s associative network will present the different aspects derived from Rare Diseases.

On the one hand, the coordinator of the Early Intervention teams in Cantabria, Adelaida Echevarría, will give a talk on ‘Early Intervention’; then, Jesús Delgado, from the ES Retina Cantabria Association, will give a talk on ‘The patient’s vision’, and finally, the Director General of Planning, Organisation, Knowledge Management and Digital Health of the Regional Ministry of Health, Óscar Fernández Torre, will talk about the Rare Diseases registers.

Agenda

The Valdecilla Health Research Institute (IDIVAL), through its Nursing Research Group, is launching two free online courses as part of the European JACARDI project (Joint Action on Cardiovascular Diseases and Diabetes). These trainings, endorsed by the Cantabrian Health Service, are designed to promote self-care and health literacy among the population.

The JACARDI project aims to reduce the health and economic impact of cardiovascular diseases and diabetes, two of the leading causes of healthcare expenditure in the European Union. In Cantabria, IDIVAL is leading this initiative with the goal of improving people’s quality of life and reducing the healthcare burden through health education and the promotion of healthy habits.

Two courses accessible to everyone

The first course, “Managing Diabetes and Cardiovascular Diseases: Empowering Your Health – A Comprehensive Course for Patients”, is aimed at individuals living with these conditions, as well as their families and anyone interested in learning practical self-management strategies. It is set to begin on Wednesday, March 5.

The second course, “Take Care of Yourself: Heart-Healthy Lifestyles”, is designed for the general public and provides simple guidelines on nutrition, physical activity, rest, and stress management to improve cardiovascular health. It will start on Monday, March 17.

Both courses will be available for free on the website of the Cantabrian School of Health (https://www.escuelacantabradesalud.es/) and on the official page of the JACARDI project in Cantabria (https://www.idival.org/jacardi-en-cantabria/).

A commitment to public health

JACARDI is an active initiative in 18 European countries that involves healthcare professionals from various disciplines in Cantabria, including nursing, psychology, physiotherapy, nutrition, and medicine from the Cantabrian Health Service and the University of Cantabria.

The launch of these courses is part of JACARDI’s strategies to enhance health literacy, encourage disease self-management, and promote healthier lifestyles, thus helping to reduce the economic, emotional, and healthcare burden of these conditions.

For more information about the JACARDI project in Cantabria, visit the official project page: https://www.idival.org/jacardi-en-cantabria/.

Researchers from the Skeletal, Metabolic, and Environmental Diseases Group (iESQUEMA) from the IDIVAL, have developed a new approach based on the secretome of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) as a therapeutic strategy for osteoporosis. This work, recently published in Stem Cell Research & Therapy, demonstrates that a single administration of a secretome, modified to enhance its osteogenic potential, is capable of significantly halting bone mass loss in preclinical models of postmenopausal osteoporosis.

The researchers have identified and optimized a secretome enriched with bioactive factors that have osteoprotective properties and can modulate the bone microenvironment. Unlike other cell-based treatments in development, this strategy does not require cell transplantation or modification of the patient’s endogenous cells, reducing the risk of adverse effects and simplifying its potential clinical application. Furthermore, since it is a treatment based on bioactive molecules and extracellular vesicles, it is more scalable and safer, avoiding the limitations associated with cell viability and expansion.

Results obtained in mouse models of induced osteoporosis indicate that this secretome not only prevents bone loss but also stimulates osteoblast activation, the cells responsible for bone formation. This suggests that its mechanism of action may be twofold: protecting bone from resorption and stimulating its regeneration. These findings position the MSC secretome as one of the most promising strategies in the development of new regenerative therapies for bone diseases.

The study was carried out in collaboration with the University of La Laguna, the University of Santiago de Compostela, the Marqués de Valdecilla University Hospital, the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, and the University of Edinburgh, strengthening a national and international research network in the field of regenerative bone medicine. Currently, the team is working on optimizing the secretome’s composition to improve its efficacy and assess the scalability of its production, paving the way for its future clinical application in patients with osteoporosis and other bone-related diseases.

Link to the article.

Aminah Abolore Sulayman, PhD in Chemical Engineering, has developed her work as a postdoctoral fellow at the Valdecilla Health Research Institute (IDIVAL), within the Science by Women programme of the Women for Africa Foundation. During her stay, the researcher has worked on an innovative project on the application of machine learning models for the real-time prediction of intradialytic hypotension in patients undergoing haemodialysis.

Under the guidance of Dr Emilio Rodrigo Calabia, nephrologist at the Marqués de Valdecilla University Hospital and associate professor at the University of Cantabria, Sulayman has explored advanced neural network architectures, such as recurrent neural networks and deep learning models. Using simulation tools such as MATLAB and Python, his research focused on capturing the temporal dynamics of haemodialysis data to develop a robust, real-time predictive model.

The ultimate goal of this work is to provide clinicians with advanced tools to anticipate hypotension episodes during treatment, improving patient safety and procedural efficiency. Managing the noise and variability inherent in real-world clinical data was a major challenge of the study, which required close collaboration between nephrology and data science experts.

Beyond the technological advances, Dr Sulayman’s time at IDIVAL has been a transformative experience in her career. ‘The exposure to cutting-edge medical research and the application of artificial intelligence in healthcare has reinforced my passion for data-driven innovations in medicine,’ she says.

This project reaffirms IDIVAL’s commitment to translational research and the incorporation of new technologies to improve healthcare, consolidating its position as a benchmark in the application of artificial intelligence in medicine.

Celia Gutiérrez Villegas, a nurse from the IDIVAL nursing research group and the Primary Care Management of the Cantabrian Health Service, has been awarded second prize in the Community and Social Sphere category of the 4th Research Awards of the General Nursing Council (CGE). Her project, entitled Analysis of the costs of Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) in Cantabria, will receive 8,000 euros for its development.
These awards, which in their fourth edition have received 156 candidatures, seek to encourage and motivate nursing professionals in the preparation and development of research projects, as well as to make visible the impact of the profession on health outcomes.
The study led by Celia Gutiérrez Villegas aims to estimate the magnitude of the impact of COPD in Cantabria from a health and social perspective. It proposes to calculate the direct health cost of the disease and its exacerbations, analysing its evolution before, during and after the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, the socio-demographic profile of patients and their informal carers will be studied, assessing their quality of life.

This research project is part of Celia Gutiérrez Villegas’ doctoral thesis in the Doctoral Programme in Medicine and Health Sciences at the University of Cantabria (EDUC). Her work is supervised by professors Manuel Herrero Montes and María Paz Zulueta, both from the Department of Nursing at the University of Cantabria.In addition, the study has the collaboration of a multidisciplinary team that includes Carlos Amado Diago, a pulmonologist at the Marqués de Valdecilla University Hospital, and Andrea Marcela Aceros Lora, a nurse and epidemiologist at the University Hospital of Santander (Colombia).

Clinical, health care and social impact

Studies on the cost of diseases make it possible to quantify their economic and social impact, facilitating decision-making in healthcare management. In the case of chronic pathologies such as COPD, knowing their economic burden is essential for designing strategies for prevention, health promotion and care protocols that optimise patient care.

From the nursing point of view, research in this field contributes to improving the quality of life of patients and their families, facilitating the work of healthcare professionals and strengthening coordination between primary and specialised care.

The work carried out by the IDIVAL nursing research group, with projects such as that of Gutiérrez Villegas, provides key information for the sustainability of the health system, promoting an efficient use of resources and guaranteeing equitable and quality care for people affected by COPD.

The Marqués de Valdecilla Research Institute (IDIVAL) has launched a new technological support platform, the Metabolomics Unit, an innovative technological service designed to strengthen biomedical research through the advanced analysis of metabolites. With this initiative, IDIVAL reaffirms its commitment to scientific excellence through the application of cutting-edge tools in the field of health.

Thanks to the funding obtained through the State Sub-programme for Infrastructures and Scientific-Technical Equipment of the Strategic Action in Health 2021-2023 of the Carlos III Health Institute (Expte Nº: IFEQ22/00114), the Metabolomics Unit has two advanced chromatography equipment:

• Liquid chromatography coupled to mass spectroscopy with high sensitivity configuration (LC/MS-HRMS),
• Gas chromatography with flame ionisation detection (GC-FID),

These infrastructures will allow researchers to analyse metabolic profiles with high precision, facilitating advanced studies in biomedicine, pharmacology and nutrition. In addition, the unit offers a wide range of specialised services that will contribute to the development of cutting-edge scientific projects.

This new platform is located in Tower B, floor -1 of the Marqués de Valdecilla Hospital and is coordinated by Dr. Armando Guerra and Dr. Bernardo Lavín, Clinical Analysis Service physicians, both with a solid background in the field of metabolomics and biomarker analysis.

Researchers interested in using the services of the Metabolomics Unit can obtain more information and make requests through the IDIVAL website or by contacting the team in charge directly.

With this new technological venture, IDIVAL consolidates its position as a benchmark in biomedical research, offering cutting-edge tools for the advancement of knowledge and the improvement of the health of the population.

For more information, visit: https://www.idival.org/servicios-tecnologicos/unidad-de-metabolomica/

Once again this year, IDIVAL is commemorating the International Day of Women and Girls in Science (11F) by participating in various initiatives that will take place during the week of 10-15 February. Through these activities, IDIVAL seeks to raise awareness of the role of women in science and encourage scientific vocations among young people.

Publication of videos of female researchers

During this week, IDIVAL’s social networks will publish a series of videos in which female researchers briefly explain the projects they are currently working on. The videos will be available on our  social networks.

Talk ‘Economists and Doctors, allies or enemies in health economics?

As part of the celebration on 11 February, Marina Barreda and Paloma Lanza, from the IDIVAL-UC economics group, will be giving a talk entitled Economists and Women Doctors, allies or enemies in health economics? The talk will take place on 10 February at 13:00 in the Faculty of Economics and Business Studies at the University of Cantabria. In this session, the speakers will address the intersection between economics and health, highlighting the challenges and opportunities in this field of study.

Presentation ‘From the medicine behind Popeye and Dr. House, to predictive medicine’.

Also, Alberto Piney and Judith Cobo, researchers of the IMPaCT Cohort project, will present the talk From the medicine behind Popeye and Dr. House, to predictive medicine, at the Ateneo de Santander on 12 February at 19:30h in which they will explore how medicine has evolved from traditional approaches to the prediction of diseases from large volumes of data.

IDIVAL invites the entire community to participate in these initiatives and to join in the celebration of 11 February, contributing to the promotion of the role of women in science.

The Haematology Service of the Marqués de Valdecilla University Hospital, in collaboration with IDIVAL, has participated in an international clinical trial that opens up new possibilities in the treatment of Multiple Myeloma, a type of blood cancer that is difficult to treat. The results have been published in the New England Journal of Medicine, one of the most prestigious medical journals in the world (Q1), which reflects the high impact and relevance of this research.
The clinical trial is a phase I/II trial, which means that it evaluates the safety, side effects and optimal dose of a new treatment, as well as its efficacy in a specific disease, allowing results to be obtained faster or with fewer patients.
Immunotherapy has changed the way certain types of cancer are fought, allowing the immune system to identify and attack malignant cells. In this study, the combination of two bispecific antibodies, teclistamab and talquetamab, which activate T-cells to attack myeloma on two different fronts, improving the efficacy of treatment, was tested for the first time.

The trial included 94 patients with advanced disease resistant to other treatments. The results have been very positive: 80% of patients treated at the recommended dose responded to therapy, and in 86% of cases the improvement was sustained for 18 months. In patients with more aggressive forms of the disease, the response rate was 61%, with 82% stable over time. Although the treatment can cause side effects, mainly infections, these were well managed.

This study has been possible thanks to the efforts of the IDIVAL and Valdecilla research team, which works closely with international groups to develop innovative therapies.

The results obtained support the evaluation of this drug combination as a possible new standard for treating advanced Multiple Myeloma, especially in the most aggressive cases. This publication reinforces IDIVAL’s role as a reference centre in the search for new therapeutic solutions for oncohematological diseases.