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About the ANZIC-RC

Over the last 5 to 10 years the intensive care community of Australia and New Zealand has built a track record and solid reputation for the conduct of high quality, investigator initiated clinical research concerning the diseases and treatments that affect critically ill patients. Since 2001, ANZICS CTG investigators have received consecutive annual Australian NHMRC Project Grant funding for multi-centre clinical trials totaling over $5.2M. In the same time, they have been awarded a total of $8.8M in competitive grant monies. This track record has been developed through individual achievement in addition to the highly productive collaborative activities of the ANZICS-CTG, formed in 1994. Since then, the ANZICS CTG has completed and published high impact studies of increasing complexity and size. These include the ‘low dose dopamine trial for patients with early acute renal failure’ (n=328, The Lancet 2000), the ‘Saline Albumin Fluid Evaluation (SAFE) study’ (n=6997; NEJM 2004), and the ‘Medical Early Response Intervention and Therapy (MERIT) study’ (Cluster RCT of 23 hospitals, The Lancet 2005). The Level I evidence emerging from these trials has improved clinical practice internationally.

In October 2005, $1.29 million dollars in funding was received in the form of an NHMRC Enabling Grant to establish a national centre for intensive care research. The grant was received in recognition of the track records in clinical research of the founding chief investigators (Professor Rinaldo Bellomo, Associate Professor John Myburgh, Associate Professor Simon Finfer & Professor Jamie Cooper), the outstanding productivity of the ANZICS Clinical Trials Group (CTG), and the perceived potential in developing a new high quality national resource with potential benefits to Intensive Care clinicians across the country.

The ANZIC-RC was also co-funded by Monash University and is located within the Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, at the Alfred Medical Research and Education Precinct (AMREP), in inner Melbourne. The core business of the ANZIC-RC will be the design and conduct of world-class clinical trials (Phase I, II, III) trials. The Centre will also collaborate with the ANZICS Patient Database and with other data registries to carry out large and well designed observational studies to generate hypotheses which will be tested in subsequent prospective trials. These strategies are an integral component of developing detailed research programs.

The ANZIC-RC will become a:

  1. Bi-national clinical trials methods centre including high level epidemiology, data management and bio-statistical consultants, experienced intensive care clinical researchers and the infrastructure to support medium and large clinical trials. The centre will also establish comprehensive research programs from surveys to pilot studies and larger trials. Many of these trials and programs will be linked to the ANZICS-CTG, but some will originate from independent researchers or groups.
  2. National centre for the education and training of intensive care clinicians, allied health personal, Honours students, MD students and PhD students in the design, funding, management and execution of clinical trials.
  3. Referral centre and source of advice for the Australasian Intensive Care community to support the design and conduct of clinical research trials.