Bioprinted Skin Patches for Diabetic Foot Ulcers, Now Commercially Available

Rokit Healthcare, a Korean 3D bioprinter maker, after years of carefully studying ways to handle cure for diabetic foot ulcers or DFU, recently announced the success of its new DFU regeneration platform grounded on its 4D bioprinting technology for custom-designed tissue regeneration.

This new approach for chronic healing of wound promotes a device designed for the reconstructing for treatment of DFU that was successfully tried on patients and eventually would be commercialized worldwide this 2020.

To effectively discover an advanced approach for treatment, specifically for the healing of the wound, Rokit tried the "DFU therapy" using its 4D bioprinting technology, through customized bioink developed with the own adipose tissue of the patient, that did not have any immune rejection.

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Rokit's Mission

With diabetes cases rising in most nations, patients need targeted treatments and efficient solutions for handling or managing pain. 

At present, more than 450 million adults have diabetes, that's approximately six percent of the worldwide populace, and it is anticipated to reach around 700 million people by 2045.

In addition, diabetes can impair nerves, kidneys, and eyes, lead to a heart ailment, stroke, and even the need to take out a limb.

DFUs are among the most typical complications linked to diabetes, as an approximated 50 percent of diabetic ulcers turned out to be infected and could lead to amputation.

Consequently, the mission of Rokit is to reduce the amputation rate for DFU patients, by providing safe and efficient "regenerative therapy" grounded on "4D bioprinting technology."

As part of its ongoing research, a worldwide team of Rokit researchers successfully tried its DFU regeneration platforms on people with the ailment in India. It will carry on with clinical tests in North America, South Korea, East Asia, and Europe.

The process, according to study, starts with fat tissue taken out of a patient like liposuction, for instance, which is then used for the preparation of an ECM or "autologous extracellular matrix mixture to develop a bioink loaded into the "INVIVO 4D bioprinter" of Rokit for the production of "a dermal patch."

Specifically, this patch is finally embedded at the site of the wound following the removal of impaired tissue. Research finding which came out in the journal, Diabetes, published by American Diabetes Association, described how the said patch, "applied onto the DFU patients' chronic wound site" led to a considerable size reduction of the wound following a one-time treatment.

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Rokit Technology

At present, DFUs go through treatment through dressings, skin grafting, and negative pressure. However, according to Rokit, such cures have proven not effective, expensive, and time-consuming for patients.

More so, they do not offer the right or appropriate therapeutic method as "regenerative medicine and tissue engineering would." 

Instead, Rokit's substitute cure to promote the reconstruction of the skin, with its use of bioink designs and biomaterials, have so much promise for effective custom-made 4D bioprinting, later on, to regenerate both human organs and tissues.

The INVIVO bioprinting technology of Rokit has already been obtained by research laboratories and institutions in over 25 nations that specialize in material and tissue engineering, disease modeling, drug testing, and 3D tissue.

Relatively, healing of ulcers typically takes two weeks or even up to months with a lot of the said conditions never getting cured and leading to amputations.

As a solution to this, Rokit Healthcare has pioneered the "foot generation treatment market" which is credited to highly technological development.

Nevertheless, curing diabetic ulcers is just the beginning. The firm's extraordinary treatment platform is moving into the regeneration of cartilage already, as well as other diseases and wounds.

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