Current Project Information
Client Information: Our client is UN&UP (https://www.unandup.com/) with our main point of contact being Michael Sabo (mes@unandup.com).
Need Statement: There is a need to shorten the time frostbite goes untreated and the time to localized drug delivery to improve patient outcomes and increase limb retention and function.
Project Scope: Physicians need a method to quickly and accurately deliver frostbite therapeutics to affected extremities where blood often coagulates. This timelier and more targeted therapeutic intervention will improve patient outcomes allowing them to attain extremities and relevant function for a higher quality of life. The therapeutic localization device will be accessible to all extremities impacted by frostbite, and the therapeutic agent will reach affected areas within 1 minute of device activation. Additionally, to test the validity of this localization a realistic phantom reflecting the dynamics of extremity vasculature will be fabricated. We will deliver a programmable control system for a magnet (therapeutic device) and a realistic phantom to our client UN&UP by April 25, 2025, as well as all proper documentation for fabricating the therapeutic device and phantom.
Recent Activities
We met with our client Mike Sabo. We relayed the information we had gathered from Edwin Carlen at the Microfabrication Lab at WashU on possible phantom implementations using microfluidic chips. Mike directed us to start with the simplest representations of treatment localization, and that anything else would be a bonus.
We also discussed possible implementations of our device given the brainstorming we had done in class. Mike recommended the possibility of a permanent magnet that slowly moved around a stabilized extremity in a particular path such that it generally localized treatment across all parallel capillaries of the extremity in a 2D lateral plane.
Future Steps
We are now also contacting experts on frostbite and burn treatment in animal models, not just clinical human presentations. As the perspective on the fluidics and micro-level perspective may be more readily available at this resolution of research, (many of these researchers are located in countries with high instances of frostbite such as Canada or the Nordic nations).
Questions/Things to Look Into
How could this idea of moving the magnet around a stabilized patient extremity impact patient comfort or the ability of a patient to receive parallel treatment such as rewarming?