All posts by : luka

Members of the Endeavor consortium meet eachother monthly via Teams to discuss the latest status of the Endeavor study, including the to do’s, challenges, and progress. Once a year, we can also meet live to put our heads together, which contributes immensely to the progress of the study!

Over the weekend of 10 – 13 April 2025, the consortium met in beautiful Ireland. Consortium partners were present both live and online (via Teams). Members of our PPI panel also joined us, providing useful feedback and giving us an insight into their views on the project and the PhD projects arising from the Endeavor study (see more in the PPI section on the website soon).

What was discussed? Find a brief overview below of the most important topics:

• • The Endeavor study will consist of a pilot study to test the flow and afterwards a larger study (RCT). The meeting mainly focused on the current status of the pilot study (the status of ethics committee approval at all recruiting sites, the challenges that have occurred so far, the expected start date, the flow for taking and processing biological samples etc).
  • In addition, several partners presented their plan of action for the conduct of the pilot study and the follow-up study, specifically for their part of the project.
  • Also, we discussed the steps required for a smooth start of the follow-up RCT study.
  • We will work with an electronic case report form (to enter patient data) and electronic questionnaires for the patients. These were reviewed together, with members of our PPI panel also giving their feedback.
  • Our Endeavor PhD students (7 in total) also presented their projects to our PPI panel in a short pitch in plain English. The patients gave meaningful insights and feedback to help the PhD students further along the way of their project.

Thanks to this annual consortium (and PPI) meeting, we are several steps closer again to the start of our pilot study! Hope you will follow along.

PhD student Martin Wyckmans (from the University of Antwerp, Belgium) has performed a study in collaboration with the Endeavor Chief Investigator Prof. Dr. Sheila Krishnadath. The research was presented via a poster on February 13th in Liège, Belgium at the Belgian Week of Gastroenterology (BWGE) during the Belgian Society of Gastrointestinal Endoscopy (BSGIE) session.

What was the study about? For the Endeavor study ‘brushes’ will be used to obtain cellular samples of the esophagus during endoscopy. This technique is called ‘brush cytology’. When performing brush cytology, the brush bristles exit a protective sheath and are, per standard protocol, retracted back into the sheath after sampling. This study compared the cellular yield of samples where the brush was retracted back into the sheath versus samples where the brush was not retracted back into the sheath after sampling.

Results? There was more cellular yield when not retracting the brush. As diagnostic accuracy depends on the cellular yield, this small-scale study points towards better diagnostic performance of brush cytology by not restracting the brush into the sheath after sampling during endoscopy.

Why is this important? Improving how we sample tissue of the esophagus will lead to better results for the ENDEAVOR project. By sharing this study with other researchers, research methods of other studies can be improved. This will lead to better science in a wide range of projects!