Research Networks in Medicine

The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) has set up a program for the establishment of research networks in the field of human healthcare aiming at a more effective integration of the leading research institutions (horizontal network) and qualified routine care facilities (vertical network). This should ultimately contribute to the improvement of care in patients with illnesses characterized by high morbidity or mortality. In 1999 an international selected 9 out of 160 submitted proposals as the most attractive conceptions. The German Research Network on Schizophrenia was one of the winners and shall thus be funded from 1999 to 2005. The major objective of this schizophrenia research network is the appropiation of scientific requirements to optimize prevention, acute and long-term treatment, and rehabilitation of patients with schizophrenia in different stages of the illness and thereby to improve course and outcome of the illness along with considering cost-benefit aspects. At the same time, long-term communication structures between research, service, consumers, and the public are to be established.