A pilot of a new cellular and tissue-based product derived from a patient’s own skin showed promise in closing venous stasis leg ulcers (VLUs), even after conventional treatments had failed.
Researchers treated 10 venous leg ulcer patients whose wounds remained open after at least a month of routine treatments with SkinTE, a first-of-its-kind product designed to regenerate full-thickness, functional skin that repairs and replaces a patient’s own.
Eighty percent of the VLUs closed within 12 weeks of the SkinTE treatment. Grafts took on all of the wounds, with initial signs of closure, including granulation and progressive epithelialization, “shortly” after a single treatment. One VLU, which had previously been deemed closed, reopened prior to a two-week durability visit as a result of external factors the researchers deemed unrelated to the SkinTE procedure. The final wound closed within 13.5 weeks of the SkinTE application.
“The completion of this pilot study is a pivotal step in further establishing SkinTE as a treatment for VLUs,” said study chair David Armstrong, DPM, M.D., Ph.D., Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California.
From the December 2019 Issue of McKnight's Long-Term Care News
