Canadian Nanotech Wound Dressing Saves Lives

Alberta Scientist Wins Top Innovation Award

CALGARY - Dr. Robert Burrell, inventor of Acticoat(TM) antimicrobial wound dressings, will receive this year's $100,000 EnCana Principal Award from the Ernest C. Manning Awards Foundation. The nanocrystalline silver coated dressings are used in clinical practice in over 40 countries around the world to prevent life threatening infections and promote wound healing.

Acticoat(TM) is the world's first commercial therapeutic application of nanotechnology. Since 1997, the nanotech dressings have become the treatment of choice in settings such as burn units, diabetic foot clinics, chronic wound clinics and nursing homes. Dr. Mayer Tenenhaus, who treats about 300 burn patients a year at the University of California at San Diego Medical Center, says that Acticoat(TM) is "the biggest breakthrough in wound care in the last 40 years."

The sustained release of silver from Acticoat(TM) dressings mean that they can be left in place for days, thus saving the patient the pain and trauma of frequent dressing changes. The unique coatings also have potent anti-inflammatory activity. The dressings have saved limbs and lives, allowed paediatric burn patients to safely recover at home, and healed decades-old debilitating wounds in weeks.

Burrell is the lead inventor on over 290 patents and patents pending related to Acticoat(TM) technology. He began developing the innovation in the 1990s in his role as a research director with Westaim Biomedical Corp. A microbiologist by training, he also grew to become a renowned expert in burn and chronic wound healing. Today Burrell is the Canada Research Chair in Nanostructured Biomaterials and a professor with both the Faculty of Engineering and Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry at the University of Alberta.

Acticoat(TM) dressings and related products are manufactured by NUCRYST Pharmaceuticals Corp. in Fort Saskatchewan, Alberta and marketed internationally by UK-based Smith and Nephew Plc. NUCRYST, a spinoff of the Westaim Corp., supports the local economy with over 100 high tech manufacturing jobs.