March 2014 – European Narcolepsy Network (EU-NN)
European Narcolepsy Network (EU-NN)
The 5th European Narcolepsy Day (END) was held in Copenhagen, March 14-16, chaired by Dr. Prof. P. Jennum.
The EU-NN annual assembly was held the day before, on March 14th. An audience of around 100 people from Europe followed the scientific meeting. The speakers presented state of the art presentation and/or hot topics concerning pathogenesis: genetics and autoimmunity; autonomic functions; neurobiology of REM sleep and cataplexy; comorbidities and treatment. The Day of the Patient was another feature of the meeting. Patients met with representatives from various European countries. A new website was presented.
The 2014 winner of the EU-NN Young Investigators Award was Dr. Armand Mensen with the article entitled “Humour as a Reward Mechanism: Event-Related Potentials in the Healthy and Diseased Brain”, A Mensen, R Poryazova, S Schwartz, R Khatami, Plos One, 2014.
During the EU-NN Assembly two board members stepped down: M Tafti and R Khatami. G Mayer, GJ Lammers and R Riha were (re)elected as members of the Board.
R Peraita-Adrados and M Partinen will remain for one additional year. The Assembly participants elected G. Mayer as the new president of the EU-NN.
EU-NN 2014 grants for young scientists and for senior investigators were selected for five applicants for collaborative projects (1-2 months) within different sleep centres in Europe.
More than 680 new cases have been entered in the EU-NN database in 2012-2014. Data quality algorithms classify as validated cases according to EU-NN predefined standards. These data qualify for further prospective studies. The design of the children DB is finished and it will be available at the end of the 2nd quarter. We thank the contributing centres for their effort.
As of 1st March 2014, 27 full members of 28 centres from 14 different European countries join the EU-NN. Besides the publication on the retrospective database, there have been two other recent publications on behalf of the EU-NN.
The European Network Session – European Narcolepsy Network is scheduled on: Wednesday, 17 September 2014, 17.00-18.30 in Tallinn (Estonia).
For more information, including a list of affiliated laboratories.
Gert Jan Lammers, President of the EU-NN