Washington, July 11 (IANS) A revolutionary technology being used by a surgeon permits patients to regenerate their own cardiovascular tissue.
Marc Gerdisch is using the CorMatrix Extracellular Matrix (ECM) to modify and repair cardiac structures, allowing heart tissue to re-grow inside the beating hearts of surgery patients.

The CorMatrix ECM is a unique biomaterial that harnesses the body’s innate ability to repair damaged heart tissue. Over time, it is replaced by the patients’ own tissue.

“The use of this biomaterial is a major advancement in cardiac surgery and allows us to provide our patients with restoration of normal anatomic structures. It opens the door to a new level of cardiac tissue reconstruction,” said Gerdisch.

He is the director of cardiothoracic surgery at the St Francis Heart Center and a partner at Cardiac Surgery Associates.

In August 2007, Gerdisch, who specialises in complex heart valve surgery, became the first in the world to apply this technology inside the heart, repairing a congenital defect.

“Similar uses of the ECM followed, at our and other institutions,” reported Gerdisch, who is co-director of the St Francis Midwest Heart Valve Centre.

“Then, in March 2008, we performed the first enlargement of the path blood follows as it exits the heart using the CorMatrix ECM, in lieu of a prosthetic device, for a patient undergoing valve surgery.

The first mitral valve reconstruction using CorMatrix occurred at St Francis Heart Centre as well, in October 2008. Large defects had been created in a patient’s valve by infection. The valve was restored to normal function using CorMatrix patches, avoiding a valve replacement.

“We have been able to make similar repairs for other patients since,” added Gerdisch, according to a release of St Francis Heart Centre.

The CorMatrix ECM is derived from porcine small intestines and is processed in a way that removes all cells, leaving the complex structural matrix intact. Once surgically implanted, it serves as a scaffold, allowing the patient’s cells to infiltrate and ultimately replace the ECM scaffold.

While the patient continues to heal, the matrix gradually is replaced as the body reinforces and remodels the tissue. In the past, tissue replacement has been limited by options for implantation.