Amazing Advancements In Skin Technology Help Save Sophie's Life

Sophie Delezio is one of the two little girls seriously injured when a car drove into her childcare centre and caught fire on December 15, 2003. Sophie suffered 85 per cent burns to her body, leaving very limited skin available to cover her large burns.

The Children's Hospital at Westmead (CHW) said today that Sophie was now doing well, thanks to ground-breaking surgery carried out at the hospital with a team from Concord Hospital's Burns Unit.

The surgeons treated Sophie's third degree wounds with a combination of a bio-engineered skin graft followed by layers of skin grown from Sophie's own cells, in a series of operations which took place at The Children's Hospital at Westmead over several months.

Doctors say that the success of the procedures saved Sophie's life and is one of the first times in the world that cultured skin has successfully been grafted onto a bio-engineered skin graft.

Medical director of the burns unit at Concord hospital Dr Peter Maitz said that the procedures saved Sophie's life but were a "gamble".

"Worldwide people have been trying to get this to work without success - putting cultured cells on top of a bio-engineered skin graft.

"This is one of the first times in the world this has succeeded and we are still not exactly certain why."

As Sophie's burns to her back were extremely deep, surgeons opted to cover the wounds (in part exposed ribs and deep-muscle) with a bioengineered product called Integra -dermal regeneration template because a normal skin graft would not have succeeded in closing the wound.

This product contains porcine and shark collagen and is designed to help the body regenerate deep skin layers. The product also contains a silicone outer layer to prevent heat and fluid loss.

Once Sophie's body had accepted the bioengineered transplant the silicone layer was removed on January 16, 2004 one month after the accident. On the same day 18 sheets of skin cultured epidermal autografts (CEAs) - which were grown from Sophie's own skin at Concord Hospital's Skin Culture Laboratory, were delivered to CHW.

Dr Maitz and the surgical team, headed up by Sophie's surgeon at The Children's Hospital at Westmead, Dr Peter Hayward grafted the cultured skin, in combination with meshed grafts, onto Sophie.

More than 70 per cent of the cultured skin was accepted by Sophie's body and this enabled the wounds to close and heal.

Sophie is the youngest and most severely burned patient to have been treated with the cultured skin. Dr Maitz said that Sophie's age and size was an obstacle but may have also helped the healing process.

"Without the cultured skin we would only have had less than 10 per cent of her own skin available for grafts," said Dr Maitz. "This would have meant she would have had to have multiple skins grafts using the same donor site again and again."

"We had very little skin to work with but the regeneration potential of a child's skin is far greater than an adults'. Sophie's cells taken from the skin biopsy grew well in the skin lab and this was undoubtedly a factor in the success of her operations."

A joint press conference is being held at The Children's Hospital at Westmead on Thursday 3rd June at 10am to acknowledge the work of doctors and scientists at Concord Hospital who helped save Sophie's life. Opportunity to film in Skin Lab at Concord Hospital at 1pm (pool camera only) or by arrangement with Marion Downey.

Footnote: Dr Peter Maitz, medical director of the burns unit established the Skin Culture Laboratory at Concord Hospital and introduced the technology for growing skin from a patient's own sample. He has worked closely with the surgical team at The Children's Hospital at Westmead on the care of Sophie.

Sophie's grafted wound was dressed under the guidance of Sue Taggart, clinical nurse consultant in ICU and burns wound management from Concord Hospital's CEAs team. She also carries out the follow-up wound management, photographing and documenting the wound healing process and clinical outcome following CEAs. The Skin Culture Laboratory is run by senior hospital scientist Dr Zhe Li.