Biospecimens for Identification of Diseases of the Pancreas.

The recently funded GI SPORE, here at the University of Michigan, is focused on pancreatic and colon diseases. This protocol is focused on collecting data, blood samples, and tissue on subjects with pancreatic diseases, including pancreatic cancer, pancreatic cysts, pancreatitis, diabetic controls, jaundice/biliary obstruction controls, and otherwise healthy controls. A SPORE is an NCI-funded, Specialized Program in Research Excellence, with specific requirements. Those requirements include 4 projects with a clinical and a basic science Co-PI and several COREs, including a biospecimen core. Each project that has a human subjects component will require a separate protocol and IRB submission when those projects are to begin. The specific populations we are recruiting are determined by the aims of project 2 and by the need to create a repository as part of the biospecimen core (please see the grant for details on the aims of these 2 projects). A specially designed database is being built for this study to handle the data aspects. Our collaborators at Dartmouth College have significant experience in managing data as they have been our partners for our work in the EDRN (PI Brenner). Case report forms and other data collection tools have been developed and are being used to populate the database. All of the actual data will be completely deidentified per HIPAA regulations. We intend to model the data and specimen collection on the model used by our work with the NCI-EDRN. This includes a customized database, the use of kits with pre-labled, bar-coded aliquots, and standardized data collection forms (CRFs).