Scientists are to begin revolutionary surgery trials that will help breast cancer victims to regrow their breasts after undergoing a mastectomy.
The trial, to begin in Australia within the next six months, will involve implanting a device into a woman that enables fat tissue to grow by using a stem cell technique. The procedure, known as Neopec, could replace reconstructive surgery and breast implants within years.
During the operation, which was developed by scientists at the Bernard O’Brien Institute of Microsurgery in Melbourne, a 5ml dose of the woman’s own fat cells are implanted into an artificial, breast-shaped chamber in her chest. The container is attached to blood vessels under the arm enabling the cells to multiply and replace breast tissue.
The scientists have developed the technique over the past decade and have successfully tested it on pigs, which grew new breasts within six weeks. However, they predict that the process could take up to eight months in women.
Bernard O’Brien’s chief operating officer Phillip Marzella said that the results of the animal tests were so successful that they were confident about taking the next step to trial the technique on humans.
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He said that after a human trial using a synthetic chamber the scientists planned to develop a biodegradable version that would break down over time so that women did not have to undergo two operations.
“At the moment we have a shell which has been used in the animal studies but that requires two surgeries, so the next step is to develop a shell which is biodegradable,” Dr Marzella told The Times.
He said that a prototype trial involving six Australian women would begin early next year as a “proof of principle” to demonstrate that the body could regrow its own fat supply in the breast.
A second-phase trial would use international patients and would begin using the biodegradable chamber, which they hope to develop in the next year.
Dr Marzella said that the procedure relied on the body’s own behaviour of filling internal voids.
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“Nature abhors a vacuum so the chamber itself, because it is empty, tends to be filled in by the body,” he said.
If successful, the groundbreaking technique is likely to have positive physical and psychological effects on the many thousands of women who lose their breasts to cancer each year.
“We hope it will have a significant impact around the world. There are a lot of women who don’t have reconstructive surgery for whatever reason, or have silicone breast implants, but this will give them their own tissue back,” Dr Marzella said.
“We also like to think that it would alleviate the shock that a woman feels when she is diagnosed with breast cancer, to know that she could possibly grow her breasts back.”
The scientists received ethics approval from the St Vincent’s Hospital in Melbourne to conduct the three-year human trial, which will be paid for with a AUS$2.95 million (£1.66 million) government grant.
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If successful, the technology could be available to breast cancer patients by 2014.
Dr Marzella said that using stem cells of fat tissue to regenerate body parts could also have wider scientific implications.
“We also envisage that in ten years’ time this approach could be open to cosmetic surgery and, if the principle works, then it could be used in the nose or other parts of the body for reconstructive surgery,” Dr Marzella said.
Australia’s National Breast and Ovarian Cancer Centre said that the new procedure, if successful, would be in an important step forward in dealing with breast cancer.
“It is a real exciting concept in terms of tissue engineering for women who have had a mastectomy,” Dr Helen Zorbas from the centre said.