Innovation
RUBICReproUnion Biobank & Infertility Cohort
The ReproUnion Biobank and Infertility Cohort (RUBIC) was established to identify the causes and underlying mechanisms of infertility and to improve reproductive outcomes for women and men.
The Biobank emergd as a collaboration between key ReproUnion PIs and as an add-on to the routine fertility management at Copenhagen University Hospital Departments in the Capital Region of Denmark and Reproductive Medicine Centre at Skåne University Hospital in Sweden. The aim is to include 5000 couples equally distributed between Denmark and Sweden.
The first participating couples were enrolled in June 2020 when RUBIC launched a website and two films in Swedish and Danish to inspire and inform. As 2024 came to a close around 2000 couples were enrolled.
The first profile article was published in ‘Andrology’: RUBIC: A binational clinical foundation to study risk factors, life course, and treatment of infertility and infertility-related morbidity. The article explains how the biobank collects data and material to address three main questions:
- What are the risk factors and natural life courses of infertility, early embryonic loss, and adverse pregnancy outcomes?
- Can we develop new diagnostic and prognostic biomarkers for fecundity and treatment success?
- What are the health characteristics of women and men in infertile couples at the time of fertility treatment and during long-term follow-up?
Information about the ouples can be linked to the Danish and Swedish national registers to obtain information on parental, perinatal, childhood, and adult life histories, including disease and medication history. And with the growing cohort and biobank, the first research projects have been initatied using the marterial. This will enable the researchers to better understand the causes of infertility and identify novel therapeutic options.
The planning of the cohort has been guided by a voluntary external advisory board of experts from other European countries and the United States. In addition, a binational board with representatives of the ReproUnion stakeholders is ensuring optimal utilization of the collected data and biomaterial.
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