Spray-on skin is a skin culturing treatment for

burn A burn is an injury to skin, or other tissues, caused by heat, cold, electricity, chemicals, friction, or ultraviolet radiation (like sunburn). Most burns are due to heat from hot liquids (called scalding), solids, or fire. Burns occur mainl ...

, or other skin damage victims. It involves taking small samples of the patient's skin and spraying them on the wound.

History

The treatment was developed by Marie Stoner and plastic surgeon

Fiona Wood Fiona Melanie Wood (born 2 February 1958) is an English-born Australian plastic surgeon working in Perth, Western Australia. She is the director of the Royal Perth Hospital burns unit and the Western Australia Burns Service. In addition, Wo ...

. Their technique worked quicker than previous skin culturing techniques. Wood established the company

Avita Medical Avita Medical is a clinical and commercial company developing and marketing a range of respiratory and regenerative products. The first regenerative medicine product brought to the market by Avita Medical was ReCell spray-on skin for the treatment ...

in 1993 to commercialise the procedure. After the

2002 Bali bombings The 2002 Bali bombings occurred on 12 October 2002 in the tourist district of Kuta on the Indonesian island of Bali. The attack killed 202 people (including 88 Australians, 38 Indonesians, 23 Britons, and people of more than 20 other nationalit ...

, Wood used the experimental technology on victims before it had been subjected to proper clinical trials, garnering criticism from other burn specialists since at the time there was little evidence of its efficacy, and Wood had an apparent conflict of interest since she founded the company that sold the technology. A 2006

clinical trial Clinical trials are prospective biomedical or behavioral research studies on human participants designed to answer specific questions about biomedical or behavioral interventions, including new treatments (such as novel vaccines, drugs, dietar ...

in US attracted only small numbers of participants and was suspended by Avita. Clinical trials commenced again in 2010 with the assistance of a grant from the US Army. Participant rates for the new trial were again lower than expected. The technology is currently approved for use in Australia, Europe, Britain and North America.

References

{{reflist Australian inventions Plastic surgery Skin Transplantation medicine