Healing of cutaneous and mucosal wounds grafted with collagen-glycosaminoglycan/Silastic bilayer membranes: A preliminary report

This report describes the healing of cutaneous wounds in experimental animals grafted with collagen-glycosaminoglycan (GAG) matrix/Silastic (Dow Corning Corp., Midland, MI) bilayers; assesses the feasibility of using collagen-GAG matrix as a vehicle for delivering culture-selected, autogenous fibroblasts to cutaneous wound sites; and evaluates the use of collagen-GAG/Silastic bilayers as mucosal substitutes. Cutaneous and mucosal wounds in New Zealand white rabbits were grafted with either acellular collagen-GAG/Silastic membrane or collagen-GAG/Silastic membrane previously seeded with cultured autogenous fibroblasts. Over 63 days, wound sites were analyzed at intervals based on wound contraction and histology. Cutaneous wounds successfully incorporated grafted collagen-GAG matrix and were significantly inhibited in their rate and extent of wound contraction. Seeding membrane matrices with autogenous, cultured fibroblasts before grafting caused a marked increase in cellularity that persisted throughout the postgraft period. In mucosa, matrices were exteriorized rather than incorporated. This work suggests that collagen-GAG/Silastic bilayer may have value as a dermal substitute and, more significantly, may be appropriate as a vehicle for delivering cultureselected fibroblasts to cutaneous wound sites.