CAPNETZ

Competence Network Community Acquired Pneumonia

Community Acquired Pneumonia (CAP) is considered as one of the most important infectious diseases in the world with a high mortality risk. About 680.000 people are affected every year in Germany and many of them have to be treated in the hospital. In spite of the medical significance and relevance for health economics of CAP no reliable data concerning pathogens and resistance existed.

Therefore the German Ministry of Education and Research initiated the Competence Network "Community Acquired Pneumonia" (CAPNETZ) in 2001 which becomes the foundation "CAPNETZ STIFTUNG" in 2007. The initiators of the Competence Network CAPNETZ – Charité University Berlin, Medical School of Hannover and University of Ulm – are now co-founders of the CAPNETZ STIFTUNG. They transferred all rights on CAPNETZ materials to the foundation so that CAPNETZ STIFTUNG is totally capable of acting.

By connecting clinical, microbiological and basic research CAPNETZ is able to get new findings about pathogenesis of CAP especially about interaction between pathogens and hosts. More than 500 clinicians cooperating in CAPNETZ provided a better insight in German epidemiology and health care. Until 2009 more than 7500 patients could be included in the CAPNETZ database – about one-third of them were outpatients, two-thirds inpatients. Therefore CAPNETZ has the largest database of community acquired pneumonia worldwide.

With the cooperation of CAPNETZ the S3-guideline of community acquired pneumonia was generated in 2005 – a revised version was published in 2009.

> www.capnetz.de

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