The Use of Stem Cells in Burnt Wound Treatment

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The Use of Stem Cells in Burnt Wound Treatment
2
Introduction

• Nearly half a million people, from across the
  world, seek medical help for accidental burns and
  are hospitalised in severe conditions. These are
  fatal burns, often causing death. However, there
  are many other kinds of burns, which may leave
  the patients physically disabled for their entire
  lifetime.

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What are Burns?

• Burns are therefore, accidental skin cell damages
  brought on by fire, chemicals, electricity or
  radiation, leaving the skin
• terribly pained,
• swelled and
• charred.
• Treatments for burn wounds depends upon the type
  of the burn and how deep it is covering the body.

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Conventional Burn Wound Care

• A medical health practitioner always follows the
  thumb rule of cleaning the burnt area first with
  cool water and then applying gel upon it.
  However, use of autologous skin grafting
  technique was the first known severe burn wound
  treatment, reported in 1881.
• Until now skin grafting technique happens to be a
  standard practice to treat severe burnt cases.

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Conventional Burn Wound Care

• Earlier, in severely burnt cases (full-thickness
  burn or 3rd degree burn, which damages the
  epidermis and the entire dermis), doctors
  discarded and considered the burnt skin to be a
  medical waste.
• However, since it contains viable MSCs
  (burnt-derived Mesenchymal Stem Cells), that can
  be used for skin regeneration and wound-healing,
  in present times these cells are characterised
  and expanded in vitro, which is then incorporated
  into an established wound coverage material.

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Introduction of Cell-Based Burn Wound Therapy

• In is interesting to know that the culture of
  cell-based therapy for burn wounds was first
  introduced after Rheinwald and Green,
  revolutionised the cell culture technique in
  1975. So, for the very first time, clones of some
  of the major cell types was used during an
  autograft, where epithelial sheets of cells were
  produced to restore the functional capacity of
  the skin.

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Research Activities on Burn Wounds Cell
Therapy

• Such an encouraging report gave rise to worldwide
  research activities on cell therapy for burn
  wounds healing process. For example, a
  Singapore-based biotech company Cell Research
  Corporation, carried out a test which involved
  growing stem cells on synthetic scaffolds,
  preventing three burn victims from undergoing the
  painful process of skin grafting. Several tissue
  engineering approaches have been applied in
  skin-tissue fabrication and tissue substitute
  including autologous split-thickness skin graft.
  Autograft micro-skin transplantation has been
  widely used as skin-graft therapy in
  full-thickness skin defect.

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Aim of Cell-Based Therapy in Burn Wound Care

• The effectiveness of stem cell therapy in burn
  wounds have already been tested earlier. With
  further examination, the stem cell therapists
  ultimately aimed to see
• If these cells have the capacity to reduce the
  effect of the systemic inflammatory response and
  stop the infection from spreading
• An easy and early wound closure
• Speedy healing

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Aim of Cell-Based Therapy in Burn Wound Care

• Regeneration of the skin and its peripheral
  tissues
• See if the potential usage of Epithelial stem
  cells (EpSCs) with an effective application of
  Mesenchymal Stem Cells (MSCs), derived from the
  umbilical cord and cord blood, covers the wound
  and completes the healing and skin regeneration
  process.

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Epithelial Stem Cell Therapy on Burn Wound
Cover

• To prove an early and efficient wound coverage
  along with the satisfactory epithelialization,
  cultured epithelial autografts, (EpSCs and
  keratinocytes combined) is used to facilitate
  cell delivery with the aim to regenerate the
  epidermal layer of the burned skin.
• But there are several factors that limit the
  potentially of this technique

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Epithelial Stem Cell Therapy on Burn Wound
Cover

• the time necessary to culture cells
• the reliability of graft take
• the vulnerability to infection,
• long-term durability, and
• the cost of the treatment.

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Mesenchymal Stem Cell therapy for Burn Wound
Healing

• Post-burn injury wound healing is of paramount
  importance and allogeneic mesenchymal stem cells
  (MSCs) is one of the potential treatments for
  severe burn injuries
• MSCs can grow easily
• They can maintain the tissue culture
• They can migrate to support the endogenous cells
• Additionally, its immunomodulation capacity
  allows it to withstand acute cellular rejection,
  especially in massive burnt wounds

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Future Directions

• However, researches state that when burn wounds
  are treated with allogenic MSCs, the recovery is
  speedy and there are no adverse treatment
  complications.
• Clinical studies demonstrate that cell-based
  therapy can be considered as an important
  alternative for burn wound management. However,
  there are still certain scientific and technical
  factors that need to be resolved before full
  potential of the cellular devices are
  facilitated. In the meantime, more evidence is
  required for research at large to define the
  clinical efficacy and safety of cell therapy in
  burns.

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About CordlifeIndia

• CordlifeIndia provides services like stem cell
  banking, cord blood stem cell banking.
• CordlifeIndia is a consumer healthcare company
  catering to the mother and child segment.
• We provide reliable healthcare solutions through
  innovation, technological advancement and
  commitment to quality.

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References

• https//www.cordlifeindia.com/blog/use-stem-cells-
  burnt-wound-treatment/
• http//my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases/1206
  3-burns
• http//blog.medstarwashington.org/2017/06/05/resea
  rch-burn-care-stem-cells/textA20major20prob
  lem20in20burn,and20help20them20heal20faster
• http//ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5971426/
• https//cells4life.com/stem-cells-to-help-burns-vi
  ctims-case-study/
• http//stemcellres.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1
  186/s13287-019-1465-9