The meniscus cushions the knee joint from impact, It is easy to damage, and hard to repair – so every year surgeons around the world conduct about 1.1 million removal operations. But that has risks of its own, increasing susceptibility to osteoarthritis by more than 14 times in a 21-year period.
A group of researchers at the University of Bristol, England, have developed a new technology that they say could repair the meniscus, avoiding removal. The researchers, operating as Azellon Cell Therapeutics, say they have developed a cell bandage – a membrane impregnated with cells, that stimulates healing.
The technology is at a very early stage; it has demonstrated the efficacy only in the lab, and has yet to prove the concept in humans. But it plans to spin out from the university in 2006, seeking investment to take the technology into clinical trials. Results would be three to four years away, according to SETSquared Partnership, a tech-transfer consortium of the universities of Bath, Bristol, Southampton and Surrey.
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