Advanced Cellular Therapeutics Academy

The Advanced Therapy Academy is led by Dr Francesca Kinsella, a research active Consultant Haematologist at University Hospitals Birmingham, specialising in the delivery of stem cell transplant and cellular therapies. Francesca has an active teaching and research portfolio at the University of Birmingham supervising postgraduate students in this area.

We aim to deploy a combination of face-to-face and remote access meetings, digital resources (website, podcasts, webinars), seminars and patient/public engagement events to deliver our development programme. The key elements of the Advanced Therapy Academy are: 

• A ‘Future Teams’ programme to empower new biomedical scientists, nurses, pharmacists, physicians, trial coordinators, statisticians, bioinformaticians and early career researchers, to work in collaboration and form the future networks required for clinical delivery and UK competitiveness. 
• A formal mentorship scheme, with the focus on nurturing early careers and support, to navigate career milestones (qualifications, publications, funding and employment). 
• A core syllabus with courses open to multiple stakeholders that includes Regulatory Science, GMP manufacture, Innovative Trial Design, Logistics, Bioinformatics, Patient-Reported Outcome Measures, Health Economics and Biological Endpoints.  
• Links to established Continuous Professional Developmental programmes. 
• Real-time feedback from users and course leaders of the Academy to improve syllabus, teaching tools and assessments. 
• Patient and public interaction will be embedded across all elements of the Academy.