Clinical Center News
Winter 2021

Clinical Center Increases Support for Personalized Medicine

Plans to double hospital capacity by the end of 2022
New Center for Cellular Engineering facility at the NIH Clinical Center on the Southeast patio of Building 10
The Southeast patio of Building 10 was used by staff for lunch breaks and outdoor meetings prior to the construction of the new CCE facility.
 
New Center for Cellular Engineering facility at the NIH Clinical Center
The new CCE facility was completed at the end of 2020.
 
New Center for Cellular Engineering facility at the NIH Clinical Center
The new CCE facility was completed at the end of 2020.
 

While the patient census has been reduced during the pandemic, projects to improve the hospital have continued. A new addition to enhance the Clinical Center's ability to create personalized medical treatments has come online. A newly constructed facility for the Center for Cellular Engineering (CCE) has completed construction and is expected to be fully operational in late Summer.

The new facility is expected to help the CCE meet the increasing demand for customized cellular-therapy products and services needed for personalized treatments and represents the most recent expansion of the Clinical Center's Department of Transfusion Medicine's growing capacity to support intramural cellular-therapy protocols.

NIH researchers have increased demand for cellular research including CAR-T immunotherapies and gene therapies to treat cancers and rare diseases, pluripotent stem cells to treat macular (vision) degeneration and therapies creating faster and more effective treatment for sickle cell and other diseases. With additional capacity, the CCE plans to move innovative therapies quickly and efficiently through the product life cycle.

The new facility is awaiting commissioning, performance qualification and an inspection. Once it has been approved, the Clinical Center will begin renovation on other CCE operations in the hospital to further modernize and increase capacity.

Currently, the Cell Processing Section staffs 11 active rooms for cellular engineering as well as laboratories to develop and characterize novel cellular products. The CCE anticipates providing 15 active cell development spaces by the end of 2021 and 22 operational areas by the end of 2022.

Read about the East terrace groundbreaking event in the 2019 issue of CC News.

- Maria Maslennikov

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