Medical devices fabricated from homopolymers and copolymers having recurring carbonate units

Claim 1

A medical device selected from the group consisting of nerve channels, vascular devices for vascular regeneration or growth, orthopedic device for bone repair or fracture fixation, wound covering or wound closure devices and tendon or ligament repair devices, said device comprising a body formed totally or in part of one or more biopolymers selected from the group consisting of homopolymers or copolymers having at least one type of recurring monomeric unit of the following General Structures I or II: ##STR12## wherein: Z is --[C(R 5 R 6 )]--, --[NR 5 ]--, --O-- or a combination thereof, where Z is selected such that there are no adjacent heteroatoms; n is from 1 to about 8; m is from 1 to about 8; R 1 , R 2 , R 3 , and R 4 are the same or different at each occurrence and are hydrogen, aryloxyalkyl, alkoxyaryl, aryloxyaryl, arylalkyl, alkylarylalkyl, arylalkylaryl, alkylaryl, arylcarbonylaryl, alkylcarbonylaryl, alkoxyalkyl, or aryl or alkyl substituted with one or more substituents selected from the group consisting of alkyl, aryl, alkoxy, aryloxy, dialkylamino, diarylamino and alkylarylamino; and R 5 and R 6 are the same or different and are R 1 , R 2 , R 3 , R 4 , dialkylamino, diarylamino, alkylarylamino, alkoxy, aryloxy, alkanoyl, or arylcarbonyl, or any two of R 1 to R 6 together may form an alkylene chain completing a 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 or 9 membered alicyclic fused ring system, spiro ring system, bicyclic ring system, tricyclic ring system or a combination thereof, which system may optionally include one or more non-adjacent carbonyl, oxa, alkylaza or arylaza groups; with the proviso that when said biopolymers are copolymers having recurring units of the Structure I derived from trimethylene carbonate, the other recurring monomeric units of the copolymer are not derived from glycolide or glycolic acid; and with the further proviso that when the said biopolymers are homopolymers having recurring units of the Structure II derived from ethylene carbonate or propylene carbonate then m is other than 1.