Dr. Lauralyn McIntyre was awarded $1 million to conduct a Phase II clinical trial of mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) in patients with septic shock. Dr. McIntyre and her team, including Drs. Duncan Stewart, Dean Fergusson and Shirley Mei, previously conducted the first clinical trial in the world of MSC therapy for septic shock. This new funding will allow them to conduct a larger randomized controlled clinical trial in approximately 10 centres across Canada.
“Researchers around the world have spent decades trying to find new therapies for septic shock, but so far nothing has improved survival, nor the quality of life for survivors of this devastating illness” said Dr. McIntyre, senior scientist and critical care physician at The Ottawa Hospital and associate professor at the University of Ottawa. “We urgently need new treatment approaches, and we need to test these potential treatments in the context of randomized controlled trials like ours.”
Co-Investigators and collaborators include Alexis Turgeon, Alison Fox-Robichaud, Bernard Thébaud, Brent Winston, Christine Caron, Claudia Dos Santos, Dean Fergusson, Duncan Stewart, Geeta Mehta, Gregory Korbutt, John Granton, John Marshall, Kednapa Thavorn, Keith Walley, Margaret Herridge, Mario Ruediger, Michael Chasse, Michael Matthay, Shane English, Shirley Mei, Tim Ramsay, the Canadian Critical Care Trials Group, Sepsis Canada, the Centre for Regenerative Therapies Dresden, patient partners and project manager Josee Champagne.
Originally published in The Ottawa Hospital Research Institute