The Hochgebirgsklinik Davos, Cardio-CARE and Davos BioSciences have jointly launched the RECOVER project at the Davos Medical Campus. RECOVER involves the establishment of the world’s first excellently characterised cardiac rehabilitation cohort. The RECOVER research project aims to collect medical data from cardiac rehabilitation patients and make an important contribution to improving the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular diseases.
Cardiac rehabilitation is an important component in the treatment of a large number of patients with cardiovascular diseases, especially after cardiac surgery. In order to tailor rehabilitation more closely to the individual medical needs of each patient and subsequent events (keyword: precision medicine), targeted research projects are required. Unfortunately, rehabilitation research is not typically supported by third-party funding from industry because neither specific drugs nor specific medical devices are at the centre of attention.
RECOVER closes an important gap in improving the care of patients in rehabilitation and is funded by the Kühne Foundation on the Davos Medical Campus as a long-term project. Each year, around 1200 patients who stay at the Davos High Mountain Clinic for several weeks will be included in the study. Following the example of the clinical cohort studies being investigated in the Department of Cardiology at the University Medical Centre Hamburg-Eppendorf under the direction of Professor Stefan Blankenberg, we are planning a comprehensive characterisation of the patients in Davos during their hospital stay. This includes examinations at the beginning and end of rehabilitation. In order to be able to assess the further development of the patients after treatment, they will also be followed up with examinations after the end of their hospitalisation. A special feature of RECOVER is that not only classic laboratory chemical parameters are recorded, but also targeted research into so-called biomarkers, which could possibly have a predictive value for the individual course. In addition, important patient-related questions, such as the influence of the disease and the customised rehabilitation treatment on quality of life, are collected.