Competence areas are interdisciplinary lectures, in which key clinical illnesses and common symptoms are taught with a concise and multidisciplinary approach.

Teaching in this competence area incorporates the subjects of human genetics, biochemistry, gynaecology and paediatrics (paediatric endocrinology). The aim of this competence area is to have students think about the relationship between genotype and phenotype when treating patients with common or rare diseases. Ultimately, this will help students to focus for patients who require molecular genetic clarification. This will help students understand why patients with the same phenotype may show different levels of clinical severity of a condition. At the same time, students will be required to critically examine how, given a specific genotype, a targeted intervention can therapeutically influence the clinical phenotype in the most favourable way.

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Assistant Prof. Dr. Bodo Beck
Email bodo.beck@uk-koeln.de

The “desire to have children” competence area examines the causes of infertility from the perspectives of gynaecology and human genetics. All modern techniques in reproductive medicine for the treatment of an unfulfilled desire to have children are presented. In addition, the legal, ethic and social (societal) aspects of treating the desire to have children are presented; further, the use of genetic methods, such as pre-implantation diagnostics is discussed in the context of “in vitro fertilization”.

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Prof. Dr. Christian Netzer
Email christian.netzer@uk-koeln.de