A 20 years old patient who was born with a rare birth defect called microtia which means the external part of the ear that is the pinna is small and malformed has received a 3D organ transplant.
About 1500 babies are born in the US with this condition. This
might not be a life-threatening condition but it brings much bullying to such
children which eventually triggers stress and anxiety in them.
The patient who received the new ear was one of the first to
have had a successful transplant as part of the clinical trial.
The surgery was conducted by Dr. Arturo Bonilla, a pediatric
ear reconstructive surgeon
Previously the technique for this condition was harvesting
cartilage from the patient’s rib and then shaping it into an ear’s shape
The company uses collagen-based “ bio-ink “ that is safe in
the body and also keeps all the materials sterile.
PROCESS
The surgeon first removed half of the gram of cartilage from
the woman’s malformed ear and then the healthy ear was 3D scanned
The patient’s chondrocytes cells for cartilage formation were
isolated from the tissue sample and grown in a slurry of nutrients, proliferating
into billions of cells. the exact mixture has not been out yet due to a proprietary
issue.
The cells then were mixed with the company’s collagen-based
bio-ink. the collagen was inserted through a syringe into the specialized
printer that squirted out to create a mirror replica of the patient’s healthy
ear
The mind-blowing thing is that the whole process of printing
only took less than 10 minutes.
PREVIOUS BREAKTHROUGH
In January of 2022, surgeons from Maryland had transplanted
a genetically modified pig’s heart into a human patient extending his life by 2
months.
Scientists are also developing various techniques that would
otherwise decrease the need for a donor and would also decrease the wastage of
donor organs.
A case from Switzerland showed that a person received a
liver that was preserved for 3 days and yet it is still functional in the body
even after 3 years
The trials are still going and it is possible that eh transplants
could fail or bring unanticipated health complications but since the cells are
from the patient’s tissue, the new ear is not likely to be rejected by the body.
the clinical trial will be followed for five years to evaluate the long-term safety and aesthetic outcomes of the patients, so far 11 volunteers include
aged between 6 to 25 years.
This work of 3DBio’s success is not a work of a month or a
year but they were continuously working on this for seven years after which
they came to such a recent breakthrough.
The technology if works can be a revolutionary in the field
of medicine. it can be used for much another replacement parts including spinal
discs, noses, knee menisci, rotator cuffs, and reconstructive tissues for
lumpectomies.
Further advancements in this 3D organ printing can be used
to further produce even the vital organs like the liver, kidneys, and pancreas.
It definitely would
not be a piece of cake from making an ear that is mostly an appendage to a functional
ear but it definitely would show the light to that journey any time soon.
That’s it for today.