Researchers develop new way to repair lining of brain and spinal cord

Christy Han
Tue, 02 Apr 2024 00:48:02 +0000
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Researchers at the Ohio State Wexner Medical Center contributed to the development of a strong adhesive to be used to prevent fluid leakages after brain surgery. Credit: The Wexner Medical Center

Patients requiring surgery to repair the brain and spinal cord may experience better results due to new research at the Wexner Medical Center.?

Researchers recently developed a more durable way to repair the lining of the brain and spinal cord through a strong adhesive hydrogel, called Dural Tough Adhesive, or DTA, which can address fluid leakages that may happen when repairing dural linings after surgery. Prior to the development of DTA, the options for repairing the dura were limited, with surgeons either using sutures or inserting a graft, said Dr. Kyle Wu, assistant professor of neurosurgery at Ohio State and author of the study.

“The adhesive allows the tough gel to stick to tissues, even on wet surfaces,” Wu said. “And that’s the key information here because most surgical glues don’t stick to wet surfaces.”

The dural membrane, also known as the “dura,” is the outermost of the meningeal layers — three layers of tissue that line the central nervous system, which includes the brain and spinal cord — according to a Wexner Medical Center press release.?

The dura also contains cerebrospinal fluid, which surrounds all central nervous system tissues and provides nourishment, waste removal and brain protection, according to the National Institute of Health. Injury or brain surgery may cause the fluid to leak, which can threaten patients’ lives, neurological functions and recovery if infections like meningitis or other complications such as brain bleeds occur.?

Wu said when surgeons need to do brain surgery for brain tumors or strokes, they have to open the dura, which is sometimes difficult to repair if it is damaged or injured.?

The tough gel of DTA itself is stretchy, but the adhesive is very strong, allowing it to stick to the tissue, which is something that doesn’t exist in the current operating environment, Wu said.?

“Basically it allows us to do things that we haven’t been able to do before,” Wu said. “The tough adhesive is a platform technology that can be used for multiple things like dental indications, vessels, cardiac and more.”

This technology was developed by a collaborative team of bioengineers at the Wyss Institute at Harvard University, the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, and neurosurgeons at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Ohio State, according to the Wexner Medical Center press release.

Dr. David Mooney, a Wyss Institute faculty member and professor in bioengineering at Harvard, led the research team. He said his team is excited to have opened a new perspective for neurosurgeons that “could facilitate a variety of surgical interventions and lower the risk for patients who need them,” according to the release.?

To Wu, DTA provides an exciting breakthrough in surgical technology that makes repair procedures more effective.

“In essence, that kind of combines the best properties of all of the current repair techniques and allows for a more accurate placement and a more robust adhesion for repair,” Wu said.?

It will also prevent patients from returning to the operating room due to spinal fluid leakage and infection after surgery, reducing costs and the mental burden of reoperation for patients, Wu said. The technology was developed by collaborating with practitioners and researchers, and it also allowed developers to find other ways to apply DTA to other surgical procedures.?

“This is a collaborative effort between [the] basic scientist, translational scientist and clinician,” Wu said. “We work together on this and believe that medical professionals should be doing more often getting involved in these kinds of collaborations to advance things for patients.”