Marco Chaud

By Marco V. Chaud, Thais F. R. Alves, Márcia A. Rebelo, Juliana F. de Souza, Venâncio A. Amaral, Cecilia T. Barros, Katiusca S. Pontes, Carolina Santos, Patricia Severino and Lindemberg M. Silveira Filho

Dilated cardiomyopathy (DMC) of ischemic or non-ischemic aetiology remains a lethal condition nowadays. Despite early percutaneous or medical revascularization after an acute myocardial infarct (AMI), many patients still develop DMC and severe heart failure due to cardiac remodelling. Possibility of regenerating myocardium already damaged or at least inducing a more positive cardiac remodelling with use of biodegradable scaffolds has been attempted in many experimental studies, which can be cellular or acellular. In the cellular scaffolds, the cells are incorporated in the structure prior to implantation of the same into the injured tissue. Acellular scaffolds, in turn, are composites that use one or more biomaterials present in the extracellular matrix (ECM), such as proteoglycans non-proteoglycan polysaccharide, proteins and glycoproteins to stimulate the chemotaxis of cellular/molecular complexes as growth factors to initiate specific regeneration. For the development of scaffold, the choice of biomaterials to be used must meet specific biological, chemical and architectural requirements like ECM of the tissue of interest. In acute myocardial infarction, treating the root of the problem by repairing injured tissue is more beneficial to the patient. Inducing more constructive forms of endogenous repair. Thus, patches of acellular scaffolds capable of mimicking the epicardium and ECM should be able to attenuate both cardiac remodelling and adverse cardiac dysfunction.

Part of the book: Materials, Technologies and Clinical Applications