Textile-Based Spinal Plate for Tissue Ingrowth and Controlled Mobility
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Solution Overview
Problem
Current spinal plate technologies either provide complete immobilization or limited mobility, but lack a low-profile design that allows for optimal tissue ingrowth and flexibility, and existing methods for creating three-dimensional embroidered structures are complex and costly.
Innovation Solution
A textile-based plate with a lattice-like structure formed by load-bearing, stabilization, and filler filaments, allowing for tissue ingrowth and flexibility, combined with a manufacturing process that uses embroidery on a dissolvable substrate to create a porous, flexible implant with customizable properties.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Stability of the object's composition
If traditional rigid plate assemblies are used to immobilize affected vertebrae, then stability and immobilization are improved, but device profile and flexibility are worsened
Solution Approach 1:
The patent employs a textile-based plate constructed from interwoven filaments forming a flexible, thin structure that can be contoured to fit the vertebral surface. This textile construction provides the necessary flexibility and low profile while maintaining stability through the interwoven filament structure and bone ingrowth promotion.
Solution Approach 2:
The plate utilizes composite textile materials comprising multiple filament types (load-bearing, stabilization, and filler filaments) woven together to create a structure that combines flexibility, strength, and porosity. This composite approach allows the device to achieve both low profile and immobilization stability.
2Adaptability or versatility
If slideable housings with rods are incorporated to allow limited mobility, then flexibility is improved, but device profile increases
Solution Approach 1:
The textile plate incorporates dynamic characteristics through its interwoven filament structure that allows controlled motion. The load-bearing and stabilization filaments are arranged to permit limited physiological movement while maintaining overall stability, eliminating the need for complex slideable housing mechanisms.
3Strength
If dense solid structure is used for plate implants, then structural strength is improved, but tissue ingrowth is worsened
Solution Approach 1:
The textile plate is constructed with an inherently porous structure due to the interwoven filament arrangement. This porosity allows bone and tissue ingrowth through the plate structure while the load-bearing filaments provide the necessary structural strength. The stabilization filaments further reinforce the structure without blocking tissue penetration.
4Shape
If three-dimensional embroidered structures are created using traditional methods, then structural complexity is improved, but manufacturing complexity and cost increase
Solution Approach 1:
The manufacturing process begins with a pre-formed mesh substrate that provides the base three-dimensional structure. Load-bearing, stabilization, and filler filaments are then embroidered onto this substrate in predetermined patterns, creating the final complex structure through a simplified sequential process rather than attempting to create the entire three-dimensional structure through complex embroidery alone.
Data Source
AI summary
A textile-based plate implant (and related methods) that supports tissue ingrowth within the implanted implant structure and is suitable for use in a variety of surgical applications, including but not limited to anterior, posterior and lateral surgical approaches directed towards the lumbar, thoracic and cervical regions of the spine.