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US scientists proposed a new way to treat burns
Last reviewed: 20.05.2018
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Specialists from the Department of Surgical Research of the US Army Institute intend to use the technology to create new tissues for use in the treatment of patients with damage to the skin (extensive burns).
Before the method is available for widespread use, specialists intend to test it on several volunteers.
The commission, which controls the quality of drugs, approved the use of skin cells taken from the patient to create skin sections in the laboratory that are necessary for transplantation. Such skin fragments were used in burn centers for the treatment of children.
In the new research project, 12 participants will participate, which have damaged more than half of the body surface.
In the burn center of the army university noted that annually to them for treatment comes from 500 to 2 thousand victims who received burns more than half of the body surface.
Due to the methods of growing from the patient's cells suitable for transplanting skin areas, those with extensive burns get much more chance of surviving. Today, such patients are also on treatment, but often they have blood infection and infection in the wounds.
Human tissue cells are used in tissue engineering, which are placed in a special nutrient medium and grown, then the treated cells are mixed with a special solution and placed on a substrate for which certain cells, proteins, etc. Are used.
The uniqueness of the new method of growing skin cells from cells is that the skin flaps consist of two layers at once: the epidermis and the dermis.
It is assumed that in the burn patients, the surgeon, after cleansing the wound and removing the damaged tissue sites, will plant two-layer skin flaps grown by the new technique. This method will significantly reduce the risk of infection in open wounds or rejection of donor skin.
Modern burn surgery uses mainly the skin from donors, in whose role the relatives of the victim or a deceased person who is suitable for the parameters can act. An obligatory part of such treatment is suppression of the immune reaction with the help of special preparations, which is aimed at preventing the process of rejection of new tissues.
On the cultivation of skin by the new method takes a little less than a month - this time is enough to grow the skin on average 10x15cm
This does not allow using the existing technology to treat burn patients who have a large area of skin.
Researchers from the military institute intend to find another way that will reduce the time of growing the skin.
At the same time, specialists from this institute began to study other technologies that help to repair tissue after burns. For example, researchers interested in the technology of one company from Britain, which proposed to apply an enzyme solution to the cleansed wound with the skin cells of the patient.
Currently, American experts conduct clinical trials and say when new technologies for treating burns will be available for widespread use is difficult.