CULTURED SKIN AS A SMART MATERIAL FOR HEALING WOUNDS - EXPERIENCE IN VENOUS ULCERS

The healing of chronic wounds is a difficult and varied problem. The e ngineering of a cultured skin tissue offers an adaptive therapy for ch ronic wounds. Our hypothesis has been that living tissue can act as a 'smart material' to heal wounds. We have examined the healing characte ristics of a bilayered cultured skin equivalent (Graftskin(TM)) in a c ontrolled study and present clinical data from interim analyses for 23 3 patients over 6 months of treatment. All venous ulcer patients will be followed for up to 1 year. We report on three basic scenarios of he aling: (i) promotion of healing by secondary intention, (ii) persisten t biological wound closure with stimulation of underlying healing, and (iii) healing by frank graft take of the cultured material with remod elling of the tissue over time. Our results indicate that the cultured skin equivalent is responsive to individual wound conditions and thus acts as a 'smart material' in the chronic wound.