Professor Kaj Blennow, Section of Psychiatry and Neurosurgery at the University of Gothenburg/Sahlgrenska Academy, receives the Söderberg Prize in Medicine 2016, for his research on Alzheimer's disease. The prize money is one million SEK.

- I am so happy to hear that! It is a great honor for me to receive the Söderberg Prize in Medicine," says Kaj Blennow when he receives the news. "It is also very gratifying that this type of clinically related biochemical research is being recognized. Today, there are several new very promising drugs that are in the final stages of clinical trials, and the day they are hopefully available to patients, there will be a huge need to be able to diagnose Alzheimer's early in the course of the disease.

Kaj Blennow has had a tremendous impact on Alzheimer's research, contributing to the discovery and development of biomarker analysis for the disease.

- It is thanks to his efforts that these now very valuable and common tests are used in clinical medicine, neurology, geriatrics and psychiatry, as well as in drug development worldwide," says Kerstin Nilsson, chair of the award jury.

Kaj Blennow's goal has been to make his research results available in the clinic, and his laboratory was therefore the first in the world to introduce these analyses into diagnostic routine. A large number of European countries have since followed in his footsteps and the analytical methods are now also used in the USA, Australia, South America and Japan.

The Söderberg Prize in Medicine recognizes clinical medical research whose results have become evident over the past ten years. The prize has been awarded since 1986—until 2014 in collaboration with the Ragnar Söderberg Foundation—and the recipient is selected in cooperation with the Swedish Medical Association.

The prize of SEK 1 million was presented by HM The Queen at a ceremony on April 7, 2016 at the Swedish Medical Association in Stockholm.

Kaj Blennow
Professor Kaj Blennow is the research director of the Neurochemical Laboratory at the Department of Neuroscience and Physiology at the Sahlgrenska Academy, University of Gothenburg. He earned his medical degree at Lund University, received his Ph.D. in 1990 with a dissertation on Alzheimer’s disease at the University of Gothenburg, and has served as a senior physician and head of the Neurochemical Laboratory at Sahlgrenska University Hospital since 1995. He has received numerous international awards, including the Alois Alzheimer Research Award in 2001, the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ECNP) Research Award in 2010, and the Alzheimer’s Association Lifetime Achievement Award in 2011. Blennow has held the Torsten Söderberg Academy Professorship in Medicine since January 2015. 

Kaj Blennow, GU