Fish Skin for Human Wounds: Iceland’s Pioneering Treatment

Fish Skin for Human Wounds

The FDA-approved skin substitute reduces inflammation and transforms chronic wounds into acute injuries.

Six hours north of Reykjavik, along a narrow road tracing windswept fjords, is the Icelandic town of Isafjordur, home of 3,000 people and the midnight sun. On a blustery May afternoon, snow still fills the couloirs that loom over the docks, where the Pall Palsson, a 583-ton trawler, has just returned from a three-day trip. Below the rust-spotted deck, neat boxes are packed with freshly caught fish and ice. “If you take all the skins from that trawler,” says Fertram Sigurjonsson, the chairman and chief executive officer of Kerecis Ltd., gesturing over the catch, “we would be able to treat one in five wounds in the world.” (more…)

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Severe Burn Victims May Soon Be Able to Regrow Hair-Bearing Skin

Regenerates Full-Thickness Hair-Bearing Skin in Burns and Wounds

PolarityTE (TM) Regenerates Full-Thickness Hair-Bearing Skin in Burns and Wounds Using Their Revolutionary Platform Technology. First ever known successful regeneration of full-thickness skin and hair; Company poised to initiate human trial in the third quarter of 2017; Management to host conference call Thursday, June 8th at 4:30pm ET.

Salt Lake City, UT — (Marketwired) — 06/08/17 — PolarityTE™, Inc. (NASDAQ: COOL) today announced pre-clinical results demonstrating that the Company’s lead product, SkinTE™, regenerated full-thickness, organized skin and hair follicles in third degree burn wounds. The findings represent the first known successful regeneration of skin and hair in full-thickness swine wound models, the standard animal model for human skin. The Company expects to initiate a human clinical trial evaluating the autologous homologous SkinTE™ construct in the third quarter of 2017. (more…)

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Wound-healing molecule found in parasitic worm could help prevent amputations

dr smout wound healing molecule parasitic worm

A substance found in parasitic worms’ spit might help prevent thousands of amputations a year, scientists in north Queensland have said. James Cook University researchers in Cairns are harnessing the molecule produced by a Thai liver parasite that can “supercharge” the healing of wounds.

Australian Institute of Tropical Health and Medicine parasitologist Michael Smout said non-healing wounds were of particular concern for diabetics and smokers. Dr Smout said the parasite used the molecule to keep its host healthy and prolong its own life. “It’ll live for a decade or two, and it’s munching around your liver, and zipping up the wounds as it goes,” he said. (more…)

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