2014 Stepping Strong Innovator Awards Video – Brigham and Women’s Hospital

The Boston Marathon bombing in 2013 brought tragedy to the city of Boston. However, from the horrific event, emerged a unified strength from the Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) community. One example of such strength and finding good in tragedy is the Stepping Strong Innovator Awards. Part of the Gillian Reny Stepping Strong Fund that was established by the Reny family following the bombing, the goal of the Innovator Awards is to inspire and fund innovative research addressing clinical problems in areas related to bone regeneration, limb transplant, advanced stem cell technology, orthopedic and plastic surgery, bioengineering, rehabilitation and others around trauma care at BWH.

Starting October 20th, the public will have the opportunity to decide, via an online vote, who will be awarded a $100,000 Stepping Strong Innovator Award grant to fund a deserving research project. Three finalists from the BWH Division of Plastic Surgery, Department of Medicine, have been selected and their projects will compete head-to-head in a public competition. The finalists are Matthew Carty, MD, whose project is focused on developing a new surgical approach to lower limb amputation and its alignment with next-generation prosthetics; EJ Caterson, MD, PhD, who has created a device that can completely enclose extremity wounds from traumatic blast and burn injuries to optimize treatment conditions; and Indranil Sinha, MD, whose idea involves using a patient’s own stem cells grown in the lab to regenerate muscle tissue.