The ARC Training Centre for Multiscale 3D Imaging, Modelling and Manufacturing is excited that parts of its own tissue engineering & regenerative medicine program with one of its industry partners, namely BellaSeno, is linked to the research of D/Prof. Dietmar W. Hutmacher, Prof. Owen Ung, Dr. Michael Wagels and the entire interdisciplinary team conduct in the past, present and future.
After 10 years of fundamental and preclinical research led by D/Prof. Hutmacher and his interdisciplinary team, a world first breast implant trial in Australia aims to provide a safer alternative to permanent silicone implants.
The interdisciplinary research team from HBI, BellaSeno, QUT, CBCI (and many other partners), developed a 'scaffold guided tissue engineering conception’ from bench to bedside'. The implementation trials are currently taking place at Metro North Health in Brisbane!
So, what's new?
Well, put simply, scientists use a cutting-edge 3D printer technology to additively manufacture a biodegradable scaffold that guides the biological regeneration of a woman's breast. The highly porous scaffold is made from the same group of medical grade biomaterials used for dissolvable sutures used in millions of patients every day.
Surgeons explanted a silicon implant which the patient received more than a decade ago and implanted the 3D prited biodegradable scaffoldin combination with patients own tissue scaffold in the same surgery session. The scaffold acts as a structural guiding template for the patient’s own tissue; and after 3-4 years after implantation, the scaffold will completely resorbed by a natural process similar as by bioresorbable sutures.
Once dissolved, the patient's own newly-formed tissue will remain where the scaffold once was. This solution aims to prevent the complications or illnesses that occur as a result of silicone breast implants.