Positivity: Burn victim, Genzyme honor skin graft pioneer
From Framingham, Massachusetts:
Posted May 09, 2008 @ 12:30 AM
Thirteen years after a fireball from a crashed plane burned most of her body, Shirley Badke finally got a chance yesterday to thank the Harvard University scientist whose medical creation saved her life.
“A huge honor to meet you,” she told cell biologist Dr. Howard Green at Genzyme Corp.’s New York Avenue Science Center, where the Cambridge biotech firm had just dedicated a conference room in his name. “Thank you.”
Inside the room, Badke and her doctor recounted her ordeal for Green and a group of Genzyme employees involved with Epicel, the company’s skin replacement product.
On Jan. 12, 1995, the Georgia woman was on the phone inside her Augusta office when she turned and saw a wall of flame racing her way. She could only manage a quick curse before the inferno engulfed her.
Covered in flames, Badke was pulled outside by her boss, who avoided the worst of the disaster.
“It was beautiful blue sky, but I saw bones in my fingers,” she said.
It turned out that a twin-engine Cessna had crashed near their office, skidding into the building and exploding in a torrent of flaming airplane fuel. Burned over 86 percent of her body, Badke was rushed to the Joseph M. Still Burn Center in Augusta and put in a drug-induced coma.
For the next seven months, the burn center’s Dr. Herman Orlett used patches of Epicel to slowly replace Badke’s skin, a difficult process not guaranteed to succeed.
“Had it not been for what we got from you folks, I don’t think she’d be here today,” Orlett told Green and the Genzyme group.
While today’s Epicel patches are bigger than the ones Badke received - 60 square centimeters, or about the size of a postcard, compared to 25 square centimeters - the process is basically the same, Genzyme staff said. A postage stamp-sized piece of undamaged skin is taken from the patient, then shipped to the company’s Cambridge lab.
Lab scientists take cells from the skin’s outer layer and begin growing colonies in incubated flasks, using cells from mice that act as “feeders” or “nurses” for reasons that are still not fully understood. The colonies form new sheets of skin, which are then placed under Vaseline-lined surgical gauze for protection during shipment.
Due to the delicate nature of the sheets - they are thinner than Saran Wrap - a human courier takes them on commercial jets to burn centers, with the lab’s special containers getting their own seats. The sheets are then grafted onto the patient, with the surgeon and the lab coordinating how many can be applied at one time and at what point the wounds are ready to receive the treatment.
In 16 days, the lab can produce enough skin to cover the whole body, or about 16 square feet.
With a number of patients able to receive skin grafts directly from other parts of their bodies, Epicel is only intended for those with severe and extensive burns like Badke. While her replacement skin has no sweat glands or ability to create pigment, she told the crowd she is happy to be alive and is not shy about going out in public.
“I’ve changed physically, but I’m still the same person,” she said. …..
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