Immunotherapy is rapidly becoming a standard approach in the treatment of various diseases, with cancer therapies leading the the way over the past decade. Thanks to recent advances in understanding the crucial role of the immune system in disease control, immunotherapy has become life-changing for some patients. Nonetheless, many questions remain unanswered, particularly why some patients do not benefit from treatment or develop immune-related adverse events. To address these challenges, the Amsterdam UMC ImmunoTherapy Center was established in 2021, aiming to uniteclinicians and scientists to foster collaboration and accelerate the translation of immunological research into new treatments and diagnostic tools.

Immune Monitoring Unit: Advancing Patient Care

Recently, the ImmunoTherapy Center has optimized its infrastructure for a dedicated “Immune monitoring Unit”. This unit serves as a center of expertise and provides a platform for immune monitoring in both clinical trials and pre-clinical research. Studying the immune system’s response to treatment offers valuable insights that can support clinical decision-making, Whether uncovering mechanisms of action or helping to predict treatment success, this knowledge directly benefits patients.

While the field of immune oncology has been a pioneer in immune monitoring, integrating knowledge on effects of therapies on the immune system can be beneficial to all fields implementing immune modulating therapies.

Practical Support and Collaboration

The Immunotherapy Center aims to make immune monitoring accessible by offering a database of optimized panels for high-dimensional immune cell phenotyping and support research groups in conducting experiments and complex analyses. If you are interested in exploring possibilities, please contact us at immunotherapycenter@amsterdamumc.nl .

Furthermore, we are also committed to building and keeping connection between researchers and clinicians and maintain a network of professionals from various disease areas working with immunotherapy such as Oncology, Neurology, Hematology, autoimmunity and infectious diseases. We organize a yearly network event, filled with scientific discussion, social interaction and good food. Our next event will be held in October 2025. You can pre-register by sending an email to immunotherapycenter@amsterdamumc.nl

More information about the center on our website (link to Immunotherapy Center)

Director
Marjolein van Egmond

Business Development Director and Operational Manager
Annelies Turksma

Executive Board
Juan Garcia Vallejo
Tanja de Gruijl
Yvette van Kooyk
Sarah Derks
Theo Rispens
Marijn Kramer