NIH and partners host meeting to discuss the future of spinal cord injury research

Research and patient community to discuss challenges and potential breakthroughs  

WHAT:

The National Institutes of Health (NIH) and its partners will host a meeting of researchers, clinicians, patients and patient advocates to discuss spinal cord injury (SCI) research and to chart a course of future studies. The two-day meeting will focus on three important timepoints for spinal cord injury: acute, sub-acute, and chronic. Other sessions will discuss the latest pre-clinical, clinical, and technological research relating to SCI. Overall, the meeting aims to discuss how to overcome barriers and improve collaboration.

Michael Boninger, M.D., from the McGowan Institute for Regenerative Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh will give the keynote presentation. Dr. Boninger will draw on his experience as a physical medicine and rehabilitation physician and a researcher that crosses the boundaries between laboratory and clinic to set the stage for a discussion of what the future could hold for persons with spinal cord injury.

WHEN:

February 12-13, 2019, NIH Natcher Conference Center, Bethesda, Maryland

In-person registration for this event has closed; however, the event will be streamed via webcast at https://videocast.nih.gov/.

For more information about the meeting, including a complete agenda and list of speakers, please visit https://meetings.ninds.nih.gov/meetings/SCI2020.

WHO:

The following NIH event organizers will be available for interviews:

• Lyn Jakeman, Ph.D., Director of Neuroscience, NIH’s National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS)
• Alison Cernich, Ph.D., Director, National Center for Medical Rehabilitation Research, Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)