This year, MCIRCC has had its eye on one of the most multifaceted diseases in critical care--one that still flies under the public radar but which continues to pose enormous challenges to patients, families, and medical communities across the globe: sepsis.

It all started with our first annual Grand Challenge Symposium back in January. With the spotlight on sepsis, the two-day event concluded with the release of our Grand Challenge RFP to support milestone-driven research guided by co-principal investigators from the U-M Medical School and College of Engineering. Fourteen proposals were submitted, and in July, after to two rigorous evaluation rounds, MCIRCC announced that it would fund six projects based on the depth and breadth of their science and apparent commercialization potential.

We arrived at these six projects by considering market need, clinical relevance, real-world applications and challenges, interest and potential funding from external partners, alongside a clear commercialization pathway. Ultimately, this approach really sums up the very purpose of MCIRCC's existence--to accelerate the best ideas in critical care research for rapid translation from laboratory bench to patient bedside, with the singular goal of transforming the face of critical care.

To top it all off, as a result of a recent report issued by the Center for Healthcare Research & Transformation (CHRT), as well as a study published in The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), media attention on sepsis is rising. While the information presented may be alarming to many citizens, this coverage could quite literally mean the difference between life and death and driving positive change.

And so, as we head into September, Sepsis Awareness Month, it seems fitting to highlight all that MCIRCC, its members, and alliance partners are doing to stymie the prevalence of this deadly and pervasive disease. Hopefully, with our Grand Challenge projects gearing up and September focusing on what our diverse teams can do to treat this disease, we will continue to develop big, bold solutions that make a difference in people's lives.

Warm Regards,

Kevin R. Ward, MD

Executive Director, MCIRCC

Researchpalooza is hosted every year by the Medical School Office of Research, in conjunction with the UMHS Ice Cream Social. This year MCIRCC, along with 68 different campus labs and offices, will exhibit at the event.

The U-M Medical School has issued a Request for Proposals for the U-M Michigan Translational Research and Commercialization for Life Sciences Program (U-M MTRAC).

Sponsored by the Medical School in partnership with the Office of the Vice President for Research, the Office of Technology Transfer, and the Michigan Economic Development Corporation, MTRAC supports funding for proof-of-concept and other early-stage development studies, regulatory guidance, and consultation and mentoring from industry and investment experts outside the University.

This year MTRAC will be using UMMS Competition Space to manage the proposal submission process, and each proposal must have a Medical School Principal Investigator with efforted appointment at the Medical School. Proposals will be evaluated on the basis of scientific merit, potential health care impact and significance, the potential for commercialization, and likelihood of obtaining further support. Last year, 11 different proposals were awarded in the four targeted markets: devices, diagnostics, therapeutics, and healthcare IT.

Instructions for proposal submission can be found at the U-M MTRAC website.

Questions? Contact Bradley Martin, Commercialization Program Director at (734) 936-8577 or bradmart@med.umich.edu.

Offering funding up to $25,000, Kickstart Awards provide support for preliminary studies or development activities such as animal testing, prototype development, beta development, or drug-candidate screening. The FFMI team is specifically seeking proposals that address a discrete milestone that is critical to the advancement of research to the point of product development. Funds will enable activities that can help a project along a developmental path from lab to clinic, potentially making it more eligible for commercialization.

All interested faculty must complete a pre-submission application before submitting a full proposal. Following completion of a pre-submission application, research teams will work directly with FFMI staff to determine an appropriate research plan and key milestone before submitting a complete proposal for review. Mentorship will be provided during the award period to guide further commercialization efforts.

Kickstart will be an ongoing program, with proposals being reviewed on a rolling basis until available funding has been distributed. Additional details about this program, including pre-submission forms, are available on the MTRAC website.

If you have any questions regarding the MTRAC Kickstart Award or other resources within FFMI, please contact Nick DeHaan at nmdehaan@umich.edu.

MCIRCC is thrilled to announce that Jaine Place has joined the Catalyst Team as manager of its new Proposal Development Unit, a core service for members.

MCIRCC has also appointed Ken Spenser as its commercialization coach. Similar to his previous role as a Mentor-in-Residence with the U-M Office of Technology Transfer, Ken helps individual MCIRCC faculty members and multidisciplinary teams develop commercialization roadmaps to accelerate the bench to bedside process and position their innovations for licensing or potential business startups. He is also working with the six Grand Challenge Sepsis projects that recently received MCIRCC funding.

Back in January, nearly 50 MCIRCC members attended the first annual MCIRCC Critical Care Grand Challenge Symposium targeting sepsis, an incredibly complex public health problem that represents more than one million cases annually, a mortality rate up to 40-percent, and the single largest hospital treatment cost in the United States.

Sepsis is garnering more and more media attention, with recent articles in the Detroit Free Press, the Grand Rapids News and on MLive as a result of a recent report issued by the Center for Healthcare Research & Transformation (CHRT) and a study published in The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) on hospitalized patients with sepsis. 

As outlined in the CHRT issue brief, The Cost Burden of Disease: United States and Michigan, hospital discharge rates for septicemia rose sharply among the total population in both the U.S. and Michigan--jumping 57 and 62 percent, respectively, over four years. In 2011, this resulted in total charges for septicemia diagnoses of $74.2 billion in the U.S. and $1.9 billion in Michigan. 

"The rise in severe sepsis can be attributed in part to the fact that more people are surviving life-threatening diseases such as cancer, but those patients also become more vulnerable to diseases such as severe sepsis," says MCIRCC Member Theodore J. Iwashyna, M.D., Ph.D., and co-author of Hospital Deaths in Patients With Sepsis From 2 Independent Cohorts published in JAMA. "Healthy people are also at risk for severe sepsis if they have an infection which triggers the condition." 

Putting the spotlight on sepsis--its seriousness and increasing prevalence--is a step in the right direction. By emphasizing recognition of symptoms, warning those at-risk and reiterating the need for rapid treatment and strong policy leadership alongside innovative treatment options, MCIRCC believes we can change the sepsis paradigm to positively impact this deadly condition.

If you are speaking with the media about your work in critical care research or are working with the U-M News Service or U-M Health System Public Relations on a health care related press release, article, or other news item, please mention your MCIRCC affiliation!