SKIN PRINTING AND AUTO-GRAFTING

摘要

An apparatus and method for the production of substitute skin that advantageously reduces the amount of donor dermal cells needed from non-wound areas of a patient having a wound to be auto-grafted is reduced by using all of the harvested skin cells. A 3D printer is used to construct a wound graft product from the harvested skin cells without wasting any of the harvested skin cells. In a case of an irregularly shaped wound, wastage of harvested skin associated with trimming is avoided.

主权项

1. A computerized skin printing system, comprising:
a quantity of living donor skin cells harvested from a non-wound area of a patient having a to-be-treated wound or tissue defect; a three-dimensional printer that processes the quantity of living donor skin cells harvested from a non-wound area of a patient having the wound or tissue defect, wherein the three-dimensional printer is under control of a controller connected to the three-dimensional printer; an imaging device; a computer that performs steps of receiving a set of images taken by the imaging device of the wound or tissue defect and processing the imaged wound or tissue defect into a set of skin-printing instructions that are provided to the controller connected to the three-dimensional printer.