This meeting entitled “Cellular Therapeutics in Trauma and Critical Care Medicine: Forging New Frontiers” on September 25 and 26th was well received and executed smoothly without any issues. The meeting stimulated extensive discussions, collaborations and interactions amongst a highly diverse group of individuals. The speakers chosen were experts involved in multiple areas of cellular therapies. These areas ranged from pre-clinical efficacy and safety, cell production and processing, and finally clinical trials and commercialization. The group of participants was composed of blood bankers, academia, industry, NIH, DOD, AABB and FDA representatives. This conference’s strength was that it brought together multiple groups involved in trauma and also cellular therapies. All of these groups have the capacity to fuel the complete translational pipeline for cell therapies in trauma from start to finish. Many participants asked that we re-run this meeting next year or early 2017. There was significant interest and enthusiasm generated by the groups participating. A supplement to the journal Transfusion is now currently being prepared to represent some of the key talks at the meeting. If our goals are achieved, scientific knowledge and clinical practice in stem cell biology and regenerative medicine will be advanced for trauma/critical care patients.
