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Biomedical project aims to establish a top research center

An ambitious five-year project launched this year will incorporate Taiwan's strong information technology (IT) capability into the biomedical field, with the aim of making the nation an important center for genomics research and clinical research in Asia, Minister Without Portfolio Lin Ferng-ching (林逢慶) said yesterday.

The first details of the "Taiwan-Biomedtech Island (生醫科技島)" project, which has funding of at least NT$15 billion, were introduced by the Science and Technology Advisory Group (STAG) under the Executive Yuan yesterday.

Three main goals

According to Lin, the project's three major goals include constructing national health information infrastructure (NHII) in Taiwan, building the world's most competitive database of DNA samples aimed at markets in ethnic Chinese communities worldwide and strengthening clinical research for medical professionals.

"Taking advantage of Taiwan's well-developed information technology sector, NHII will become a platform for transporting information, building a standard format for the transportation of medical images and data, and secure Web safety," Lin said.

Lin said that the infrastructure would form the basis for future community-based medical services and personal health management.

In addition, Lin said that a pilot project completed last year that set up Taiwan's first national genetic database -- and involved 3,000 subjects -- will be expanded into the "Taiwan Biobank." The biobank aims to collect DNA samples from about 300,000 Taiwanese people for future medical research.

Officials said that Taiwan might model the UK Biobank database, which plans to track health records over several years, gathering information for research, with the long-term aim of improving human health.

"We have to build the genetic database in the very near future because we are competing with others in Asia, such as Singapore. However, the health records collected over the last decade through our single national insurance system are an advantage," said Chen Tzay-jinn (陳再晉), deputy minister of the Department of Health.

Taiwan's diverse ethnic mix could help make the Taiwan Biobank one of the most competitive health databases among ethnic Chinese communities worldwide, Chen said.

STAG officials said that building a similar database to help develop drugs for common diseases is a global trend, citing famous projects such as Iceland's Decode Project, a US database in Wisconsin, the Estonian Genome Project and the Singapore Tissue Network.

Clinical research

Hwang Jung-chiou (黃重球), director-general of the Department of Industrial Technology at the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA), said that medical practitioners will be encouraged to team up with academics to form a flagship clinical research center in Taiwan.

Medical practitioners will also be encouraged to engage in studies on the genetics of complex diseases or translational medicine research, a field that aims to "translate" discoveries made by scientists or researchers into improvements in patient care.

"It's been worldwide trend. Most leading scientists have been working on translational medicine and Taiwan's advantage in offering better conditions for research might attract more overseas experts in the field," said Alice L. Yu (陳鈴津), associated director of the Genomics Research Center of the Academia Sinica.

In addition, officials said that hospital resources will also be linked with the medical appliance industry.
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