A Wirelessly Controlled Smart Bandage with 3D‐Printed Miniaturized Needle Arrays

Abstract

Chronic wounds are one of the most devastating complications of diabetes and are the leading cause of nontraumatic limb amputation. Despite the progress in identifying factors and promising in vitro results for the treatment of chronic wounds, their clinical translation is limited. Given the range of disruptive processes necessary for wound healing, different pharmacological agents are needed at different stages of tissue regeneration. This requires the development of wearable devices that can deliver agents to critical layers of the wound bed in a minimally invasive fashion. Here, for the first time, a programmable platform is engineered that is capable of actively delivering a variety of drugs with independent temporal profiles through miniaturized needles into deeper layers of the wound bed. The delivery of vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) through the miniaturized needle arrays demonstrates that, in addition to the selection of suitable therapeutics, the delivery method and their spatial distribution within the wound bed is equally important. Administration of VEGF to chronic dermal wounds of diabetic mice using the programmable platform shows a significant increase in wound closure, re‐epithelialization, angiogenesis, and hair growth when compared to standard topical delivery of therapeutics.

A review on smart dressings with advanced features

“…In vivo studies involving animal models have revealed that electric stimulation of these important wound healing processes results in more collagen deposition, 110 enhanced angiogenesis, 110,111 greater wound tensile strength, 112 and a faster wound contraction rate 113 . These findings are supported by previous research conducted by 98,99,101–104 . Studies have demonstrated that electrical stimulation can effectively enhance tissue perfusion, leading to substantial increases in transcutaneous oxygen pressures specifically in the sacral region of individuals with spinal cord injury (SCI) 113 .…”

Electrostatic Flocking of Insulative and Biodegradable Polymer Microfibers for Biomedical Applications

“…Fibers embedded and adhered well to the 1:1 gel:CHS adhesive, demonstrating stability and gradual degradation under prolonged incubation in simulated body fluid (SBF) (Figures 3b and 4c(iv)). [28] Top and side views of scaffolds revealed high fiber density and alignment (Figure 3d,e). Fiber densities of scaffolds generated at different time points were calculated by quantifying fibers in a given geometric area and scaling for total scaffold area.…”

Wound Management, Healing, and Early Prosthetic Rehabilitation: Part 3 - A Scoping Review of Chemical Biomarkers

“…In place of murine models, the remaining bench research studies utilized cell lines and tissue samples (15 sources 41 , 42 , 45 , 53 , 95 , 98 , 108 , 132 , 135 , 139 , 151 , 166 , 196 , 237 , 242 ), a mathematical model (1 source 76 ), and a gene expression dataset (1 source 156 ). Categories 9 to 11 (80 sources; Table 2 ) specifically investigated diabetic wounds, while 7, 55 , 101 , 141 , 148 , 184 , 211 , 214 4, 64 , 161 , 163 , 173 2, 87 , 155 and 4, 53 , 139 , 166 , 242 sources explored skin wounds, traumatic injuries, sciatic nerve injuries, and wound/scratch assays (a type of cellbased wound model), respectively.…”