Assessment of the Immediate, Short- and Long-Term Deleterious Consequences of Polytraumatic Injury in a Critical Care Non-Human Primate Model

Multi-organ failure (MOF) remains a significant cause of morbidity and mortality in trauma. The pathophysiology behind MOF is related to a maladaptive systemic inflammatory response syndrome (SIRS) triggered by the release of excessive inflammatory cytokines. Currently, the underlying mechanism for immune dysregulation is poorly understood, and there are no existing pre-clinical models, which accurately reflect the clinical scenarios that play out in severely injured patients prone to development of SIRS. The study will fill existing and emerging gaps in the Combat Casualty Care Program to improve treatment for service members injured in combat. Understanding and defining the physiologic and immunologic responses after polytraumatic injury in a stringent and relevant animal model will provide insight for the clinical management and for the development of innovative therapeutic interventions/strategies designed to improve the clinical outcome after combat-related trauma. The goal is to fully characterize the immune response in a clinically-relevant NHP trauma model in anticipation of identifying therapeutic targets to mitigate the associated SIRS/MOF following poly-traumatic injury.