Movement Disorders

The Movement Disorders of scientific interest to the LUMC are neurodegenerative brain disorders, in particular Huntington’s disease, Spinocerebellar Ataxias, and Parkinson’s disease. Unique clinical expertise is united with active translational research collaboration. The LUMC is a national referral centre for these disorders, and is appointed as a European Reference Network for Rare Neurological Diseases.

Focus and Aim

The focus is on disorders in which the LUMC can make a significant contribution towards trial readiness of specific patient groups, including the establishment of patient registries, and development of meaningful outcome measures in one or more domains of the bio-psycho-social context. Additionally, to improve existing therapies and to develop innovative treatments, which is done in close collaboration with our basic science research partners.

Focus and Aim

The focus is on disorders in which the LUMC can make a significant contribution towards trial readiness of specific patient groups, including the establishment of patient registries, and development of meaningful outcome measures in one or more domains of the bio-psycho-social context. Additionally, to improve existing therapies and to develop innovative treatments, which is done in close collaboration with our basic science research partners.

 

Expert Centers

Huntington’s disease (HD)

The Leiden HD center is one of the largest clinical centers for Huntington Disease in Europe and participates in multiple national and international, investigator-initiated (e.g. EHDN seed fund, HEALTHE-RND), CHDI funded (Enroll-HD with > 500 participants), IMI and EFPIA funded (e.g. IDEA-FAST), and industry-initiated clinical trials. Patients can opt to participate in research studies, clinical trials or several biobank initiatives, like the LUMC Biobank. We actively pursue partnership with stakeholders, such as patient organizations, regulators and pharmaceutical companies

Huntington’s disease (HD)

The Leiden HD center is one of the largest clinical centers for Huntington Disease in Europe and participates in multiple national and international, investigator-initiated (e.g. EHDN seed fund, HEALTHE-RND), CHDI funded (Enroll-HD with > 500 participants), IMI and EFPIA funded (e.g. IDEA-FAST), and industry-initiated clinical trials. Patients can opt to participate in research studies, clinical trials or several biobank initiatives, like the LUMC Biobank. We actively pursue partnership with stakeholders, such as patient organizations, regulators and pharmaceutical companies

 

Parkinson’s disease (PD)

The centre for Parkinson’s disease in the LUMC is a tertiary referral centre with a longstanding track-record in care and research in PD. Together with the DBS team of the HagaZiekenhuis we are the second-largest DBS centre in The Netherlands, with more than 450 surgeries performed in 2022.

The research group focuses on an observational, multicenter, longitudinal study (Profiling Parkinson’s disease) to evaluate the role of existing and novel quantitative biomarkers in understanding the heterogeneity in the Parkinson’s phenotype and predicting treatment response as well as the occurrence of adverse drug responses, Deep brain stimulation and  Host – microbiome interactions in PD and rremote monitoring technologies for digital phenotyping PD.

Research group