Update: Banking on success

24 April 2008

One year since its launch, UK Biobank recruits its 100 000th participant.

This landmark figure means that the UK-wide medical initiative established to improve the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of a wide range of serious illnesses is well on the way to reaching its target of 500 000 participants by the end of 2010.

As part of the multimillion-pound collaborative project, researchers have collected health and lifestyle information, body measurements, and blood and urine samples from thousands of people aged between 40 and 69. The information will be added to a national database and updated as the participants’ health is tracked for up to 30 years.

Recruitment for UK Biobank began in Manchester in 2007. Since then, over 1.5 million samples of blood have been stored as part of the project; seven additional recruitment centres across the UK have opened (in Oxford, Cardiff, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Stoke-on-Trent, Newcastle-upon-Tyne and Leeds), and two more are on the way, for Reading and Bristol.