Grants Funded
Grant applicants for the 2024 cycle requested a total of nearly $3 million dollars. The PSF Study Section Subcommittees of Basic & Translational Research and Clinical Research evaluated more than 100 grant applications on the following topics:
The PSF awarded research grants totaling over $650,000 dollars to support more than 20 plastic surgery research proposals.
ASPS/PSF leadership is committed to continuing to provide high levels of investigator-initiated research support to ensure that plastic surgeons have the needed research resources to be pioneers and innovators in advancing the practice of medicine.
Research Abstracts
Search The PSF database to have easy access to full-text grant abstracts from past PSF-funded research projects 2003 to present. All abstracts are the work of the Principal Investigators and were retrieved from their PSF grant applications. Several different filters may be applied to locate abstracts specific to a particular focus area or PSF funding mechanism.
Prevention of Vein Graft Intimal Hyperplasia via PTP
Harry Salinas MD
2013
Massachusetts General Hospital (The General Hospital Corp.)
Pilot Research Grant
Microsurgery, General Reconstructive
Venous conduits are used for coronary artery bypass grafts (CABG), peripheral arterial disease and microsurgical reconstruction of the extremities. Saphenous vein grafts (SVG) are the conduits most commonly used for CABG, but they have poor long term patency rates compared to arterial grafts. Whereas 90% of internal mammary artery grafts are patent after 10 years, only ~50% of SVG remain patent. This is due to accelerated atherosclerosis of the grafts. Suboptimal outcomes of venous grafts for arterial reconstruction have also been published in plastic and vascular surgery. Accelerated atherosclerosis begins as intimal hyperplasia (IH), which is a consequence of intimal injury, from: surgical trauma; and most importantly, over-stretching of the vein graft as it is exposed to arterial pressure. Therefore, IH can be prevented if the stretch is limited. This has been validated by placing cumbersome external sheaths around vein grafts. Photochemical Tissue Passivation (PTP) is a technology developed in our institution that crosslinks surface collagen by a light activated process. The tissue is coated with a photosensitizing dye that is activated by a laser; resulting in collagen cross-linking along the surface of the tissue, which stiffens it. We have shown that PTP can significantly increase the elasticity modulus of porcine veins (i.e. make them stiffer). For in-vivo testing, we have modeled IH by making an interposition graft in the femoral artery of a rat using epigastric vein. Preliminary data shows histologic evidence of intimal hyperplasia by two weeks within the untreated vein graft. We believe that by treating the venous graft with PTP prior to its connection into the arterial system, we can diminish the intimal injury caused by stretch and prevent intimal hyperplasia. This could greatly improve the long term patency rates of the hundreds of thousands of venous grafts used yearly in the U.S. for CABG, peripheral arterial disease, and microsurgical procedures.
