National Center of Neurology and Psychiatry (NCNP), Kodaira, Japan

NCNP is one of Japan's six national centers, combining a hospital, research institutes and a brain bank for neurological, muscular and mental disorders in Kodaira, Tokyo. Within prion disease it matters in three ways that opened pages support: it hosts the secretariat of the JACOP natural history consortium and provides its steering committee chair by role, it offers an ethics-approved direct enrolment route for JACOP, and its staff are co-investigators in the health ministry prion surveillance project, with NCNP providing pathology diagnostic support. A search excerpt, not yet confirmed from the notices themselves, says PRNP genetic testing for the national surveillance moved to the NCNP Hospital laboratory in 2024. Public institutional information only; no individuals' health or genetic data. Information only, not medical advice.

Key facts

  • NCNP combines a hospital, the National Institute of Neuroscience, the National Institute of Mental Health, four centers including a Medical Genome Center, and eleven disease centers on one Kodaira site.
  • The JACOP secretariat is at NCNP Hospital, and the steering committee chair is Hidehiro Mizusawa of NCNP (public role only).
  • JACOP enrolment normally runs through the diagnosing facility, but a direct route reviewed and approved by the NCNP ethics committee exists for cases where the facility cannot review or time is short.
  • In the FY2020 to 2021 health ministry surveillance project (59,000,000 yen, led by Masahito Yamada of Kudanzaka Hospital), NCNP staff Mizusawa and Masaki Takao are co-investigators and NCNP provides pathology diagnostic support.
  • That project's goals include promoting genetic and CSF testing and cooperating with JACOP; its FY2021 summary reports 80 of 313 tested cases with a PRNP mutation.
  • The NCNP Brain Bank offers donation pre-registration, autopsy, neuropathology and frozen storage, and lists staff performing prion protein gene analysis on DNA from blood and brain.
  • Search excerpt, unverified: genetic testing for the surveillance moved from Tohoku University to the NCNP Hospital clinical laboratory in April 2024.
  • Search excerpt, unverified: Mizusawa was principal investigator of the earlier FY2016 to 2019 surveillance research group.
  • The surveillance group portal updated its consent explanation to version 1.7 and added FY2026 member information in July 2026.

Timeline

  1. 1940Founded as a sanatorium; 1986 merged with the National Institute of Mental Health to form NCNP.
  2. 2010Became an independent administrative agency; 2015 became a national research and development agency.
  3. 2013JACOP website opened with the secretariat at NCNP (date from the JACOP news index recorded in registry-jacop).
  4. 2020to 2022-03 Health ministry surveillance project with NCNP co-investigators and pathology support.
  5. 2026Consent document v1.7 and FY2026 member list published on the surveillance portal.

Last checked 1 November 2026

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