How the technology works
Utilising low-cost hollow fibre tubing currently used for haemodialysis, alongside specially engineered hardware and software, our Spatial Reach technique fuses diagnostics and therapy and has the potential to create a whole new category of advanced wound care.
A continuous spiral or zig-zag pattern of the porous hollow fibre tubing is placed into or onto the target area. The tubing is filled with saline and the surgical site can be closed, or a dressing can be applied as normal.
With the tubing in place, any biomarkers of cancer or infection can diffuse into the tube. The presence of cancer regrowth or infection can then be monitored by pumping out and analysing the column of fluid.
When the sample is passed through a handheld reader, healthcare professionals can see not only whether cancer or infection is present, but exactly where it is in three dimensions.
Critically, having analysed the sample, the Spatial Reach platform can then be run ‘in reverse’, so that chemotherapy or an antibiotic can be delivered back to just those areas within the wound where it’s required.
Slugs of chemotherapy or antibiotic are pumped back by the device into the tubing – interspersed with saline – so that the therapy ends up adjacent to the infection or cancer. The drug can then diffuse out of the porous tubing and only treats the targeted region. This allows toxic chemotherapy to be used without causing damage to healthy tissue.
It will also allow ‘last ditch’ antibiotics to be delivered which can treat superbugs such as MRSA, yet which are too toxic to be given to vulnerable patients systemically.