Method and apparatus to make vascular prostheses

Abstract

Abstract The method according to the invention represents an improvement of methods known per se for making prostheses which consist of a preshaped synthetic carrier in whose surface region endogenous cells and cell assemblages are embedded and, after the implantation, initiate a coating of the prosthesis surface or of parts of this surface with a living layer. It has emerged that even if the cells and cell assemblages to be embedded originate from a tissue which, besides these cells, also contains other cells and non-cellular tissue components, isolation of the required cells before embedding is unnecessary. For this reason it is possible according to the method according to the invention to dispense with a complicated and lengthy processing of the tissue material used to isolate the required cells, as is described for corresponding methods according to the state of the art. The tissue material is reduced in size, essentially mechanically and, if necessary, additionally enzymatically, to tissue particles whose dimensions are within limits which are as narrow as possible, and is suspended, and the preformed carrier material is treated with the suspension by the suspension being filtered through the material in the case of porous carrier material and the suspension being brought onto the surface of the carrier material by centrifugation in the case of carrier material of little or no porosity. In contrast to corresponding methods according to the state of the art, the method according to the invention can, thanks to the improvement, be carried out in very little time, that is to say directly during the operation and in a closed system.

Inventors

• 👤 Werner Mueller-Glauser
• 👤 Franz Rieser
• 👤 Pedro Bittmann
• 👤 Eric Dardel

Bibliographic Details