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.

Advances in healthcare wearable devices

“…Drug reservoirs are covered with Au anode electrode, a thin layer of Au membrane, which dissolves in phosphate buffer solution (PBS) in 40 s. When a voltage of 1.8 V is applied, the drug is delivered, and results are then shared by the wireless transmission using an RF module, which makes it a suitable HWD at POC. Furthermore, Derakhshandeh et al have proposed a smart bandage for the treatment of chronic wounds 108 . The bandage consists of microneedles, as shown in the Fig.…”

Miniaturized Needle Array‐Mediated Drug Delivery Accelerates Wound Healing

“…This mouse strain can be considered as a proper model for investigating delayed and slow wound healing. [8] Figure 3. Intradermal VEGF delivery for enhanced diabetic wound healing in vivo.…”

“…Lack of proper vascular network can result in limited tissue oxygenation and metabolic support, insufficient immune response to infection, dysregulated cell infiltration, and delayed cellular response to physiological signals. [8] Increasing evidence has demonstrated the benefits of various growth factors, cytokines, and peptides for improving wound healing. [9] Given the crucial role of vascularization in wound healing, vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) is an interesting candidate to improve the healing process.…”

Smart Microneedles for Therapy and Diagnosis

“…This passive delivery method can accurately control the amount of liquid cargos, while making it difficult to store these microneedles. The latter depends on applied high pressure such as pumping, ejection, and actuators and normally employs hollow microneedles [ 97 ]. This active delivery method is rapid and efficient but brings inconvenience to the application.…”