e-newsletter : Spring 2010
Volume 1 : Issue 1
Karen West
General Manager
Advanced Technology
and Materials Group
Welcome to the first e-newsletter for Secant Medical. We’ve included you on this mailing because we have stories and information to share that may be useful for your work in the medical device industry. After you read through these short articles on our website, we hope you’ll agree.
I’d like to share with you some current events at our end. Secant Medical launched a new branding and awareness program last year to spur new opportunities in our already-growing business. You’ll see more and more of us... on the web, in print, and hopefully on your list of approved suppliers as well. We’ve expanded our engineering capabilities, our services, our staff, and our marketing and information materials all with one goal in mind: to help the device community leverage biomedical textiles in their own products.
We are the leading provider of design, development, and custom manufacturing services for biomedical textile structures. Our services can help device manufacturers achieve a competitive advantage using textile-based components specifically engineered to provide the end-user with new product benefits.
We understand the challenges you face. You’re in a fast-paced business whose success hinges on novel solutions that bring innovation to the operating room. We can help. Textile structures will help transform implantable device designs and expand minimally invasive techniques. Advances in bioresorbables and advanced materials, innovative textile designs, complex hybrid textile compositions, and tissue engineering scaffolds will yield new device benefits. No doubt other innovations are on the horizon for textiles as well. And we’ll be right there, helping you leverage new developments for your business.
If you’d like specific information about how biomedical textiles can fit into your design solutions, please let me know. We’d love to hear from you.
Sincerely,
Karen West
General Manager
Advanced Technology and Materials Group
Design versatility is a critically important concept for an industry rightfully focused on innovation. For years, designers and engineers have sought greater flexibility in designed-in features to deliver on the promise of evolving device technologies and medical procedure.
Biomedical textiles are growing in popularity. As more in the device industry become aware of their potential for improving design options, the use of textiles will increase. Biomedical textile structures permit a high level of flexibility in several key areas: structure, delivery method, performance, physical composition, the use of resorbable polymers, and other elements of innovative devices. The benefits to device design teams are substantial, enabling pioneering designers to push the boundaries of implantable devices. Scaffolds for tissue engineering, 2-D and 3-D structures, advanced materials, and the ability to control structural degradation are just a few.
Vastly expanded options for medical device design are within reach of the industry as new textile-based constructions take their places in a host of applications. New technologies and constructions will greatly enhance the ability of device manufacturers to achieve competitive advantages in a market where novel approaches are a requirement for success. For more information on how to improve your design options across many therapeutic areas, visit: Design and Development
It’s no secret that devices are becoming more complex. Demand is on the rise for smaller surgical access areas and faster recovery times; more motion preserving technologies; increased patient comfort; and improved implant durability. Fortunately, one biomedical textile forming technology — weaving — can accommodate this long list of requirements, and more.
Weaving occupies a unique place among the available types of textile forming technologies, and for good reason. "Fiber orientation" is probably the chief factor that drives the versatility of this approach. Such diversity in the fiber placement and shape control has a direct correlation with design versatility. For your engineering team, the advantages of woven textiles run the gamut — creating complex shapes or preforms; to the tapering or flaring of a structure either gradually or abruptly; to creating near-net 3-D and multi-layer geometries. Some exciting innovations are possible thanks to weaving.
To learn more about incorporating woven biomedical textiles into your designs — and to learn more about the terminology and the technology involved — visit: Textile Science
Biomedical textiles are increasingly playing a role in high-strength sutures and anchoring devices, and for strong polymer-based cables in long bone fixation, spinal stabilization, and ligament replacement. Leveraging the ideal balance of biomaterials and design capability is the missing piece for success in the next generation of orthopedic devices.
The rigid metal that is so commonly used in the field can be a hindrance when it comes to motion preservation. Metal hardware that lacks the ability to fold or bend can also be troublesome to place in vivo without creating larger-than-desired surgical access sites.
To complicate matters, orthopedic, spine, and trauma applications can present the highest static and dynamic loads found in the human body. Fortunately device development teams have more choice today than ever before.
Each orthopedic application where textiles are used requires a unique combination of biomaterial selection and design expertise to meet the surgical demands of superior handling, ease of installation, precise fixation, and ideal physiological response. Contact Secant Medical today for more information about using textile-based elements in orthopedic devices. Contact Us
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