Engineers from Tufts University have created medical sutures that are able to monitor the wounds they are applied to.
These surgical threads are made of cotton or synthetic materials and are impregnated or coated with chemicals that react to different elements in the human body. Doctors can thus follow, from a distance, the evolution of a wound, a wound or the state of an infection in the body.
Those sutures sense pressure, temperature, stress and pH and glucose levels, and all this information is sent via a smartphone app.
Outputs of the sensors were connected to readout electronics on a different layer, which consisted of electronics for signal processing and wireless communication to a smartphone or a computer using conductive threads as interconnects.
The ability to suture a thread-based diagnostic device intimately in a tissue or organ environment in three dimensions adds a unique feature that is not available with other flexible diagnostic platforms," said Dr Sameer Sonkusale, director of the interdisciplinary Nano Lab at Tufts school of engineering. "We think thread-based devices could potentially be used as smart sutures for surgical implants, smart bandages to monitor wound healing, or integrated with textiles or fabric as personalized health monitors and point-of-care diagnostics.
Currently, these medical sutures are not yet used in hospitals, the sutures still have to go through a series of biocompatibility tests.
