The Musculoskeletal Transplant Foundation (MTF) is launching a new division dedicated to researching and providing allograft-based, biologic solutions to treat acute and chronic wounds. The division is called MTF Wound Care.
MTF is a non-profit that identifies itself as the nation’s leading tissue bank that supplies donated human tissue for orthopedics, spine and plastic surgery and sports medicine. Since its founding MTF hs distributed over six million grafts.
Kim Rounds, vice-president of MTF Wound Care, says that the organization will initially offer two forms of tissue, an allograft placental matrix called AmnioBand Membrane and an allograft dermal matrix, called AlloPatch Pliable. Both will be available, she says, in January 2015.
“These two innovative tissue forms are excellent examples of what we can bring to wound care professionals and their patients, ” said Rounds. “Both AmnioBand and AlloPatch work in concert with the body’s natural healing process. They are the first of what we plan to be a broad and differentiated portfolio of offerings for wound care. Our focus, as always, is to develop solutions that are highly advanced, safe, clinically based and cost effective.”
The National Institutes of Health estimates that in the United States more than $25 billion is spent annually to treat chronic wounds. Diabetes is a particular concern because the condition contributes directly and heavily to the wound care problem. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that there are 347 million people with diabetes worldwide. That number is expected to rise by 2030.
According to WHO, about 25% of people with diabetes will suffer a lower extremity ulcer over their lifetime. Since healing is typically slow in diabetics, there is an increased risk of infection and a higher risk for amputation. Diabetic ulcers precede 85% of lower extremity amputations.
