De Volkskrant has featured the mobile laboratory used by Sara, Fleur and Sophie to visit bedbound and/or housebound patients with ME/CFS and PAIS.
The mobile laboratory enables people who are unable to travel to a hospital to participate in research. Bedbound and/or housebound patients are underrepresented in scientific research, even though they are particularly important to study. “In these patients, we may be able to measure even more clearly what the illness does to the body,” says Jos Bosch, Professor of Post-Acute Infection Syndromes at Leiden University Medical Center (LUMC) and NMCB project leader.
During home visits, the patients’ well-being is the researchers’ top priority. If a visit becomes too demanding, the researchers stop immediately. Any knowledge they can gain is already valuable. After the blood samples are collected, part of the blood is analysed immediately in the mobile laboratory, while the remainder is taken to Amsterdam UMC. There, the samples are stored in the NMCB biobank, where researchers can request them to conduct research into ME/CFS and PAIS.