The Orthopaedic Innovation Centre’s (OIC’s) innovative research in applications of 3D printing of medical devices has yielded a published patent application (WO2014075185 A1) titled ‘Antimicrobial articles produced by additive manufacturing’. By combining antibiotics and/or bone-growth-promoting compositions with build materials, on-demand or customized patient specific implants can be created using 3D printing technologies. These implants can deliver medication efficiently and immediately direct to the applied area. The capability of printing porous and complex structures also allows for pin-pointed channeled delivery of medication to the exact location required.
This innovative process has quickly gained the attention of the 3D printing community and was recently the basis of news articles on 3DPrint.com and softpedia.com. The articles can be found at http://3dprint.com/7793/3d-print-antibiotics-implants/ and http://news.softpedia.com/news/Say-Goodbye-to-Injections-3D-Printed-Antibiotic-Rich-Implants-Will-Save-You-From-the-Pain-449146.shtml.
The full patent application can be viewed at http://www.google.com/patents/WO2014075185A1?cl=en.
For further information on this and other innovations happening at OIC contact us.
