Meeting Overview
Summary of Activity
ARDS is a life-threatening inflammatory lung condition characterized by increased vascular permeability, alveolar capillary leakage, alveolar damage, and pulmonary edema. Causes of ARDS are direct pulmonary injury (e.g., pneumonia, pulmonary contusion, fat emboli) and extrapulmonary injury (e.g., sepsis, severe trauma, cardiopulmonary bypass). ARDS typically arises during hospitalizations and is associated with high morbidity and mortality. A meta-analysis of 72 studies reported between 1994 and 2006 shows mortality rates ranging from 10% to 72% (with a pooled rate of 43%). The National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute of the National Institutes of Health estimates that approximately 150,000 Americans are affected by ARDS annually and that it leads to approximately 2.2 million days in the ICU. Recent gains in survival are thought to be related to new ventilatory and nutritional strategies and better fluid management and advanced supportive measures.
Presentations and discussions will focus on evidenced-based practices for the care of patients who are critically ill with ARDS and also sepsis and pneumonia. Topics to be covered at the conference include:
- Consensus (or the lack of it) on the Definition of ARDS
- The ARDS Phenotype and its Relationship to Disease Outcomes
- Clinical Management Variables which Modify Disease Outcome
- Roadblocks to Successful ARDS Clinical Trials?
- The Funding of Clinical Trials in ARDS
- Lung Damage: Novel Mediators of ALI
- Cellular Death and Cytoprotection
- Lung Repair: Tissue Regeneration and Stem current definition of ARDS and the limitations of defining ARDS and disease outcome based on phenotyping
- Understand the current approaches in clinical management of acute lung injury including ventilator strategies
- Be able to explain the current challenges for successful ARDS clinical trials
- Be aware of the newer signaling mediators of ARDS involved in cellular injury, death, and cytoprotection
- Be aware of existing preclinical studies on the use of stem cells in acute lung injury
- Understand novel pathways implicated in the lung’s innate immune response.
Sessions will enhance the knowledge of attendees about definitions, diagnosis, and clinical management of acute lung injury; preclinical and clinical investigations; and new discoveries about the basic science behind acute lung injury. We hope that you will join us at this landmark conference
