WCE 2017: A Novel Drug-eluting Ureteral Stent for the Treatment of Upper Tract Urothelial Carcinoma – A Proof of Concept in-vivo Porcine Study
Dr. Chen described an in-vivo experiment in a porcine model conducted by him and his research team. The bilayer coating was only administered in the middle section of the stent (400 μg of MMC), then inserted unilaterally into the left ureter of three female pigs on the same day, where the cohort would be survived through 1, 2, and 8 days, respectively. For each pig, the ureters were dissected and tested for the amount of MMC present in the proximal, middle, and distal ureter.
After the first and second days, detectable MMC was only found in the middle ureter, then both in the middle and proximal ureter, respectively. On the eighth day, no detectable MMC was found in any section of the ureter. This was compared to a fourth pig that had 40 mg of MMC injected intravenously to act as a control (simulating the current clinical practice). The pig was survived for one hour before euthanasia, but had no detectable amount of MMC in any section of the ureter.
The presentation was brought to a close as Dr. Chen described his hopes for this technology. The study was mainly an exhibition of the successful production of a drug-eluting stent prototype. He mentioned how this device is capable of completely eluding a drug within 48 hours of dwell time. Dr. Chen hopes that his technology will be used with MMC or drugs like it to treat upper tract urothelial carcinoma (UTUC).
Presented by: Kenneth Chen
Authors: Kenneth Chen, Wei Shan Lim, Yingying Huang, Gordon Xiong, Pei Shan Er, Subbu S. Venkatraman, Tsung Wen Chong
Affiliation: Department of Urology, Singapore General Hospital, Singapore; School of Materials Science and Engineering, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore
Written by: Zachary Valley, Department of Urology, University of California-Irvine at 35th World Congress of Endourology– September 12-16, 2017, Vancouver, Canada.