View clinical trials related to Craniofacial Injuries.
Filter by:The purpose of this study is to confirm the safety, performance and effectiveness of Stryker's PEEK Customized Implants when used for the augmentation and/or restoration of bony and/or soft tissue deformities in the cranial and craniofacial skeleton. The study is designed as a prospective, multi-center trial with a long-term follow-up (24 months) of study participants.
The purpose of this study is to evaluate functional and aesthetic outcomes of combined facial and upper extremity composite tissue allografts on patients who have not achieved functional and aesthetic outcomes with conventional reconstructive surgical strategies and prosthetic devices.
Background: The human face is critically important for breathing, eating, seeing, and speaking/ communicating, but its most important job may be to look like a human face. Devastating facial deformities often cause affected individuals to avoid human contact and disappear from society. Although current surgical advancements can somewhat restore facial defects, this process often requires many operations and the resulting face only resembles the human face. To date, over 20 face transplants have been performed with highly encouraging functional and aesthetic results, but widespread clinical use has been limited due to the adverse effects of life-long and high-dose immunosuppression needed to prevent graft rejection. Risks include infection, cancer, and metabolic problems, all of which can greatly affect recipients' quality of life, make the procedure riskier, and jeopardize the potential benefits of face transplantation. Study Design: This non-randomized, Phase II clinical trial will document the use of a new immunomodulatory protocol (aka - Pittsburgh Protocol, Starzl Protocol) for establishing face transplantation as a safe and effective reconstructive treatment for devastating injuries/ defects by minimizing maintenance immunosuppression therapy in face transplant patients. This protocol combines lymphocyte depletion with donor bone marrow cell infusion and has enabled graft survival using low doses of a single immunosuppressive drug followed by weaning of treatment. Initially designed for living-related solid organ donation, this regimen has been adapted for use with grafts donated by deceased donors. The investigators propose to perform 15 full or partial human face transplants employing this novel protocol. Specific Aims: 1) To establish face transplantation as a safe and effective reconstructive strategy for the treatment of devastating facial injuries/defects; 2) To reduce the risk of rejection and enable allograft survival while minimizing the requirement for long-term, high-dose, multi-drug immunosuppression. Significance of Research: Face transplantation could help injured individuals recover functionality, self-esteem, and the ability to reintegrate into family and social life as "whole" individuals. This protocol offers the potential for minimizing the morbidity of maintenance immunosuppression, thereby beneficially shifting the risk/benefit ratio of this life-enhancing procedure and enabling a wider clinical application of face transplantation.
Traumatic facial injuries, especially those sustained in military combat, are characterized by destruction of bone and soft tissue. While the bony structures of the face can be reconstructed, it is difficult to return the soft tissue back to its original form. Many times, fat grafting, a common cosmetic and reconstructive procedure, is used in hopes of improving the soft tissue deformity. Fat grafting is a procedure in which a person's own fat is taken from areas throughout the body, usually the thighs or abdomen, with a small liposuction tube. The fat is then transferred into the area that has lost volume or fullness. The fullness of the soft tissue area may decrease over time because the transferred fat can be reabsorbed by the body. Altering the current fat grafting procedure, slightly, could lead to less reabsorption and a lasting fullness of the soft tissue area outcome of the fat graft procedure. The investigators are conducting this research study to help us improve the surgical treatment of people who have suffered facial soft tissue loss as a result of trauma. The goal of this research study is to see how each person's fat grafts will maintain the fat over time and to measure the quality of life during a 9 month post-surgical follow-up period. The total duration of participation is approximately 11-12 months. In this study, the investigators will concentrate the fat in the fat grafting procedure to determine whether this process will maintain the fat over time. The areas treated with enhanced fat grafts will be compared with areas treated with standard of care fat grafts. At least two areas of your face will be treated with fat grafts, (standard of care fat grafts and concentrated fat grafts). This study is the second of two clinical studies at the University of Pittsburgh using each person's fat graft with concentration of fat cells in the graft to observe if there is less fat resorption compared to using fat grafts alone. Each study is using a different concentration of fat in the fat graft compared to the first clinical study.