What is the issue for NSW?
Arthritis affects millions of Australians. It constitutes one of the single largest health expenditures, estimated at $7.6 billion by 2030. Arthritis is the top cause of chronic pain, loss of sleep and mobility, and harms relationships and the mental health of both patients and their families.
There are more than 100 types of Arthritis. They come with a wide range of comorbidities, including heart and lung disease, diabetes and stroke. Arthritis is a National Health Priority Area. However, its prevalence and staggering impacts are rising.
NSW contains large urban centres with a rising elderly population. Arthritis hits certain groups harder. These include: the elderly, women, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and people living in rural areas.
Clinicians lack molecular guides to inform disease detection, monitoring and treatment and this hampers their work. Tapering treatments often causes unpredictable, debilitating disease flares that require escalating ineffective treatments.
Effectively treating arthritis requires revealing its underlying mechanisms, at the cellular and molecular levels.
What does the research aim to do and how?
This project uses incredibly precious clinical samples, which would otherwise be discarded in hospitals, from people with arthritis flares or who are having joint replacement surgeries.
We are growing a biobank of unique samples from people with arthritis. This biobank securely stores synovial fluid, tissue, bone marrow aspirates, and peripheral blood.
This research leverages cutting-edge multiomics and genomics technologies to:
(1) identify “Rogue” immune cells driving joint pathology.
(2) determine whether Rogue cells are detectable in other affected tissues, or in peripheral blood.
(3) identify molecular pathways to inform rational, evidence-based disease detection, monitoring, and treatments using precision therapies.