VA recruits millionth veteran for its genetic research database
A moment that sums it up: 3:46 p.m
On the afternoon of November 11, the millionth veterinarian was added to the database. Employees who had waited twelve years for this moment cried.
As the goal approached, the department had launched an intensive email campaign, encouraging veterinarians to sign up online or at VA medical centers. In the few weeks leading up to the millionth vet, the few hundred registrants per day turned into thousands. The department created a ticker, which it posted online, showing the numbers.
“This is a gift to the world,” said Denis McDonough, Secretary of Veterans Affairs.
The VA will continue to enroll more veterinarians in the database, but this was a symbolic moment.
Why it matters: A diverse database provides disease insights.
Researchers have been building large databases for genetic research for years. For example, they used this to find genes that appear to confer resistance to dementia and genes that most likely contribute to obesity. The discoveries provide opportunities to understand these diseases and develop treatments.
There are other large genetic databases, but they are largely built in Europe and include few minorities. The VA says its database offers a more diverse population: 175,000 people of African descent and 80,000 Hispanics joined the Million Veteran Program. The database also contains 100,000 women.
“It’s a huge investment and a scientific opportunity,” says Dr. Amit V. Khera, a genetics researcher at Massachusetts General Hospital. He is not a VA researcher, but he has used the data through collaborations with researchers affiliated with the department.
When the database started receiving participants, approximately 600 VA researchers registered to use it. The result so far is more than 350 articles on diseases and conditions, including post-traumatic stress disorder, heart disease, hypertension and non-alcoholic liver disease.
This is how researchers discovered Dr. Sumitra Muralidhar, director of the Million Veteran Program genes associated with having flashbacks of traumatic events, a hallmark of post-traumatic stress. Now, said Dr. Muralidhar, researchers can study those genes and the roles they play, which could help develop treatments for PTSD.
The department also says it takes the privacy of patients into account. Although researchers can examine genetic and other data and links to medical records, fewer than 10 people at the VA have the links that link data to individuals. That data, said Dr. Muralidhar, are kept in a “high security” facility in Boston.
What it looks like: Veterans hope the database will help.
In 2019, a nurse at a VA hospital told Octavia Harris, 60, of San Antonio, about the Million Veteran Program. She signed up and said participating was an opportunity to help other vets and herself.
Ms. Harris, who retired in 2012 after 30 years of service in the Navy, said three conditions run in her family: diabetes, high blood pressure and arthritis. She hopes that with her genetic and health information added to that of so many others, researchers will make useful discoveries.
In her family, Ms. Harris said, people died young.
“We didn’t live to be over seventy,” she says. “I want to get past seventy.”