Development of anti-fibrotic medicines for scars.
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Development of novel anti-fibrotic medicines through phenotypic screening to prevent scar formation.
IRAS ID
238766
Contact name
Selim Cellek
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Anglia Ruskin University
Duration of Study in the UK
3 years, 0 months, 1 days
Research summary
Each year approximately 4 million individuals will suffer some form of burn injury, which, once wound healing has occurred, will present as a scar of some form. More extreme scars, known as hypertrophic scars, can lead to disfiguration, extreme pain & itching and potentially, the loss of function of the affected area. Although clear treatment and management strategies have been put in place to reduce the scarring incidence, there is no treatment that is targeted at the molecular mechanisms responsible for the scarring process.
The aim of the study is to re-purpose a drug that is already approved as a treatment for a different disease, which is able to prevent the scarring process. Tissue samples will be collected from patients being treated at the St Andrews Centre for Plastic Surgery & Burns (Broomfield Hospital, Essex). Patients will be asked to give fully informed consent before their surgery is due to take place. Tissue samples will be collected from burn patients at different phases of the scarring process and also from breast reconstruction patients. The breast tissue will act as control (unburned)tissue so that we can compare it to burned tissue.
The experiments carried out will measure the expression of specific proteins involved in the scarring process. Cells from these samples will be cultured, before being treated with transforming growth factor beta (TGF-B), the molecule responsible for initiating the scarring process. The drugs will be selected from the Selleck Drug Library, which is a collection of 1,400 approved drugs. Each drug will be screened to see if they are able to prevent the scarring process. If the study is successful, then the drug identified has the potential to improve the quality of life of burn victims drastically.
REC name
East of England - Cambridge Central Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
18/EE/0072
Date of REC Opinion
21 Mar 2018
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion