Each year, about 185,000 people in the United States undergo amputation. Nearly half of those are due to injured blood vessels cutting off circulation to a limb. Surgeons can transplant an intact vein from somewhere else in a patient’s body to avoid amputation, but not everyone has a suitable vein to harvest.
A new advance in tissue engineering could help. In December, the Food and Drug Administration approved a bioengineered blood vessel to treat vascular trauma. Made by North Carolina–based biotech company Humacyte, it’s designed to restore blood flow in patients with traumatic injuries, such as from gunshots, car accidents, industrial accidents, or combat.
“Some patients are so badly injured that