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The
flexible tissue scaffold, shown here emerging from a glass pipette with a tip
one millimeter wide
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Scientists
at University of Toronto have developed an expanding tissue patch that works
like a bandage in mending broken hearts. Repairing ischemic heart muscles
destroyed by a cardiac event with regenerative stem cells requires an
open-heart surgery.
Open-heart
surgery is an invasive and risky approach after a heart attack and delivering
the regenerative patch through a minimally invasive approach was thought to be
impossible.
But now
biomedical engineering Professor Milica Radisic (IBBME, ChemE, Toronto General
Hospital Research Institute) and her colleagues have developed a technique that
lets them use a small needle to inject a repair patch, without the need to open
up the chest cavity.
This team is
already expert in growing 3D slices of human tissue in laboratory using polymer
scaffolds. These tissues are used to test drugs pharmacokinetics in lab.
Professor
Milica Radisic says, “If an implant requires open-heart surgery, it’s not going
to be widely available to patients,” says Radisic. She says that after a
myocardial infarction — a heart attack — the heart’s function is reduced so
much that invasive procedures like open-heart surgery usually pose more risks
than potential benefits. It’s just too dangerous.”
The researchers
have developed a patch that can pass through a narrow needle, and after
reaching the target site it still has the memory to spring back to its original
shape.
The scaffold
is made out of some biodegradable and biocaompatible material that breaks down
over time as the stem cells regenerate and form new muscle tissue.
The
experiment has already been successful in animal studies and have shown that
the patch can improve heart function after myocardial infarction.
The
study was Published online 14 August 2017 in
Journal of Nature Materials.
Miles Montgomery, a researcher involved in the
study said, “Heart cells are extremely sensitive, so if we can do it with them,
we can likely do it with other tissues as well.”
The
researchers are working to develop patch for other organs like liver with
add-on of growth factor and drugs to be delivered at the site.
It’s a long
way before clinical trials are completed and the treatment is available for
patients but, a cure for mending “broken hearts” is on the way.
Here is the
video to explain how injectable tissue patch could help repair damaged organs.
