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Patient mobility agreement continues to offer cross-border reproductive treatments

Patient mobility agreement continues to offer cross-border reproductive treatments

Jan 24, 2020

One of the highlights for ReproUnion in 2019 was the renewal of the patient mobility agreement between the Capital Region of Denmark and Region Skåne. This will enable more patients to receive specialized reproductive treatment across the Danish/Swedish border.

As the first in the world, a ReproUnion supported study is randomizing men with non-obstructive azoospermia to either a needle aspiration or a microdissection testicular sperm extraction. Azoospermia is the absence of sperm cells in the ejaculate and is among the causes of male infertility. Find out more about the HER4 study in this video.

“The study would be impossible to perform without including patients from both Denmark and Sweden. Thanks to the agreement, I have in 2019 been able to operate 31 Swedish patients with non-obstructive azoospermia and thereby increase their chance to become biological fathers,” says Dr. Christian Fuglesang S. Jensen from the Department of Urology at Herlev & Gentofte hospital. The study is expected to complete in the autumn of 2020 when 110 Danish and Swedish patients will have been operated.

The patient driven focus in ReproUnion is continuously acknowledged and has been a strong contributing factor behind award nominations. In 2019 ReproUnion was a finalist for the Swedish Athena award and in 2018 for the European Commission’s Regio Stars Award in the category ‘creating better access to public services’.

“The continuation of the agreement gives more patients in the Øresund region access to specialized reproductive treatment. At the same time, it strengthens the research collaboration across the Danish/Swedish border and helps secure efficient distribution of resources in the two Regions. As an example, Skåne University Hospital in Malmö has extensive expertise in sperm and tissue analysis and the agreement enables Danish doctors to send samples to Sweden for analysis, which can lead to better treatment of infertility,” says Petter Hartman, CEO of the Medicon Valley Alliance.

The first patient mobility agreement was signed as a part of the ReproHigh project in 2013. Since then the ReproUnion partners have secured its renewal in 2017 and in 2019.