![]() Temple is one of only a few hospitals that offers it. It requires less donor skin to achieve healing of burn wounds in less time. Rae: Yes, the FDA recently approved a new treatment option called the RECELL Autologous Cell Harvesting Device (RECELL System). Q: Are there alternatives to this traditional skin-grafting approach?ĭr. It also can leave scarring and discoloration. This skin-grafting approach is generally very effective at healing, but it can be painful. We remove the burned skin and underlying tissue, and replace it with a thin layer of healthy donor skin taken elsewhere from their own body. Rae: Patients with second- and third-degree burns generally must undergo a surgical procedure. Q: How does traditional skin grafting heal severe burn victims?ĭr. This new technology became commercially available in January 2019 and is being used by only a handful of centers across the country. She and her team are now using a new spray-on skin cell technology - known as the RECELL® System - to treat severe burns. Lisa Rae is nationally respected in burn surgery and trauma and critical care. The researchers hope the treatment will prove commercially viable and encourage businesses to process tilapia skin for medical use.Temple Burn Center Director Dr. Morais said that the tilapia skin treatment costs 75 percent less than the sulfadiazine cream typically used on burn patients in Brazil, as it is a cheap fish-farming waste product. ![]() In my case, I did not need it, thank God." The tilapia skin, which has dried out and loosened from the burn, can be peeled away. After about 10 days, doctors remove the bandage. The tilapia skin is applied directly onto the burned area and covered with a bandage, without the need for any cream. The fish skin has high levels of collagen type 1, stays moist longer than gauze, and does not need to be changed frequently. He says the tilapia skin treatment is more effective than bandages that need to be changed every two days. Patients, with limbs covered by fish skin, resemble creatures from a science fiction movie.Ĭar mechanic Antonio Janio badly burned his arm when a cylinder of soldering gas leaked. In medical trials, the alternative therapy has been used on at least 56 patients to treat second- and third-degree burns. Once cleaned and treated, it can last for up to two years, researchers say. University lab technicians treated the fish skin with various sterilizing agents, and sent it to São Paulo for irradiation to kill viruses before packaging and refrigeration. The tilapia treatment can speed up healing by several days and reduces the need for pain medication, the Brazilian researchers say. "The fish skin is usually thrown away, so we are using this product to convert it into something of social benefit." ![]() "The use of tilapia skin on burns is unprecedented," said Odorico de Morais, a professor at Ceara University. In China, researchers have tested tilapia skin on rodents to study its healing properties, but scientists in Brazil say their trials are the first on humans. Scientists at the Federal University of Ceara in northern Brazil have found that tilapia skin has moisture, collagen and disease resistance at levels comparable to human skin, and can aid in healing. Tilapia is abundant in Brazil's rivers and fish farms, which are expanding rapidly as demand grows for the mildly flavored freshwater fish. Instead, gauze bandage, which needs regular changing - often painfully - is the norm. Jose Frota Institute in the northeastern costal city of Fortaleza, Brazil, May 3, 2017.įrozen pig skin and even human tissue have long been placed on burns to keep them moist and allow the transfer of collagen, a protein that promotes healing.īrazil's public hospitals, however, lack human and pig skin supplies and the artificial alternatives easily available in Western countries. Researchers in Brazil are experimenting with a new treatment for severe burns using the skin of tilapia fish, an unorthodox procedure they say can ease the pain of victims and cut medical costs.ĭoctors wrap a child's burnt skin with sterilised tilapia fish skin at Dr.
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