About Hartmut Link

Professor Hartmut Link is a German internist specializing in hematology and oncology.

He graduated and received his doctoratein 1976 from the University of Tübingen, Germany, where he trained in internal medicine and joined the Leukemia and Immunogenetics Research Group. He subsequently specialized in hematology and oncology at the Hannover Medical School , Germany, where he established the clinical bone marrow transplantation program. In 1985, he was appointed senior physician, and in 1994, he was appointed professor of medicine. From 1998 to 2017, he was Medical Director of the Department of Hematology and Oncology at the Westpfalz-Klinikum Kaiserslautern.

His research focuses on bone marrow and stem cell transplantation, infections in immunocompromised patients, supportive therapy (e.g., growth factors), and clinical trials in oncology. He has many years of experience in oncology studies and advises the pharmaceutical industry on regulatory approval processes, clinical trials, and biosimilars.

Prof. Link is the author of numerous specialist publications and textbooks, a reviewer for international journals, the editor of the Onkopti® database for digital oncological therapy protocols, and a member of several guideline committees of the German Cancer Society (including lung, colon, breast cancer, melanoma, CLL and supportive therapy).

He has also served as a board member of the German Cancer Society's Working Group on Supportive Care (AGSMO) and was the spokesperson for the Group Digitalization and of the Group Supportive Care in Medical Oncology (AIO) of the German Cancer Society. Furthermore, he is a member of the German Society of Hematology and Medical Oncology (DGHO), the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), and the European Society of Medical Oncology (ESMO). He is a member of the Ethics Committee of the Medical Association of Rhineland-Palatinate.

The idea of Onkopti

The mission of Onkopti is to publish oncological treatment protocols from experts in a central online location. The treatment plans must be standardized, continuously updated, and quality assured.

In recent years, we have seen exponential growth in knowledge in the field of medical oncology. This can only be managed with the help of digitalization, so that innovative treatment concepts can benefit our patients in a timely manner.

Onkopti was launched in Germany in 1996 at the Hannover Medical School as part of the multimedia initiative of the state of Lower Saxony. The original research project was further developed from 1998 onwards at the Westpfalz-Klinikum in Kaiserslautern, an academic teaching hospital of the Universities of Mainz and Heidelberg, and at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) in Kaiserslautern. The collaborations with the Medical Oncology Working Group (AIO) of the German Cancer Society and the pharmacy of the University Medical Center Mainz were a great success and provided important impetus.

The continuous development of a relational database with the Fraunhofer Institute for Experimental Software Engineering (IESE) in Kaiserslautern has been crucial since 2008. This also led to the development of protocol export in digital format.