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Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) tears affect 15,000 people per year in the UK alone. These injuries are particularly common amongst younger, active members of the population. The ACL helps stabilise the knee joint by connecting the femur to the tibia. Injury to the ACL therefore causes pain and knee instability, affecting the ability of patients to walk and undertake everyday tasks. This results in reduced quality of life and often leads to the development of knee osteoarthritis. As the ACL has limited ability to self-repair, 80% of cases must rely on surgical treatment to prevent this ongoing disability. Most surgeries are reconstructions where the torn ligament ends are attached (grafted) to a piece of tendon harvested from elsewhere in the patient’s knee. Unfortunately, surgery often fails, with 15% of cases needing a second surgery. Ongoing knee pain and damage to the site where the donor tissue has been taken is also common. It is therefore essential to improve treatments.

In this project, we are aiming to develop a degradable synthetic material that is designed to structurally support torn ligaments and simultaneously stimulate the repair process.

 

 

 

PUBLICATIONS

Savić L, Augustyniak EM, Kastensson A, Snelling S, Abhari RE, Baldwin M, Price A, Jackson W, Carr A, Mouthuy PA. Early development of a polycaprolactone electrospun augment for anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction. Mater Sci Eng C Mater Biol Appl. 2021 Oct;129:112414. doi: 10.1016/j.msec.2021.112414. 

Morris H, Martins JA, Lach AA, Carr AJ, Mouthuy PA. Translational path for electrospun and electrosprayed medical devices from bench to bedside, Chapter in Biomedical Applications of Electrospinning and Electrospraying,
(Woodhead Publishing), 2021,423-454, https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-822476-2.00014-5.

Main collaborators

Sarah Snelling (NDORMS)

Andrew Carr (NDORMS)

Andrew Price (NDORMS)

Laurence Brassart (Engineering Science)

 

Also supported by:

UKRMP Smart Material Hub

Funded by

Norman Collisson Foundation

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