ABH to host three events featuring Dermagraft at DF Con 2010

Advanced BioHealing, Inc. (ABH), a leader in commercializing the promise of regenerative medicine, announced that it will host three events featuring the Company’s lead product, Dermagraft® at this year’s Diabetic Foot Global Conference (DF Con) 2010, the largest annual interdisciplinary diabetic foot conference in North America.

“Delayed Progress in Wound Area Reduction After Four Weeks of Standard Care Predicts Failure to Heal Diabetic Foot Ulcers.”

Dermagraft is an FDA-approved bio-engineered skin substitute that repairs damaged tissue and supports the body’s natural healing process in patients with diabetic foot ulcers (DFUs). DFUs affect 15 to 25 percent of diabetes patients during their lifetime, putting them at risk for lower limb amputation or death if not treated properly. Dermagraft is also the focus of an ongoing pivotal trial in subjects with venous leg ulcers.

DF Con 2010 is focused on bringing together physicians and other clinicians, researchers, scientists, and limb salvage experts committed to improving standards of care in the treatment of DFUs, with the goal of reducing amputations due to the disease.

“There is much work that remains to be done for the treatment of DFUs, but we have already made great strides,” says Dean Tozer, Senior Vice President of ABH. “Through events such as DF Con 2010, we hope to continue to educate medical professionals on ways to effectively manage DFUs and increase patient compliance. Ideally, this will ultimately result in a greater standard of living for these patients and a return to normalcy after their DFU heals.”

ABH will host the following events at DF Con 2010:

• Breakfast Symposium: Optimizing the Standard of Care for Diabetic Foot Ulcers. Robert Kirsner, M.D., Ph.D., will address the evolution of DFU treatment and the subsequent formation of a new standard of care, for which Dermagraft is central, and how doctors can implement this standard in their practice. The event will be held on Friday, March 19, from 7 a.m. to 8 a.m. in Studios D and E of the Hollywood Ballroom on the mezzanine level. Dr. Kirsner is a Professor and Vice Chairman in the Department of Dermatology and Cutaneous Surgery at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, and Director of the University of Miami/Cedars Wound Center.
• Hands-On Workshop: Wound Closure. Hosted by Lee C. Rogers, DPM, and Nicholas J. Bevilacqua, DPM, Associate Medical Directors of the Amputation Prevention Center at Valley Presbyterian Hospital in Van Nuys, Calif., the workshop will be held Saturday, March 20, from 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. in the Hollywood Ballroom Studio D. At the workshop, pieces of Dermagraft will be available for attendees to practice preparing and applying to a rubber foot ulcer wound. To date, nearly 200,000 pieces of Dermagraft have been supplied to over 1,000 wound care centers and outpatient clinics nationwide.
• Poster Presentation. Robert A. Warriner, III. M.D., FACA, FCCP, FCCWS, ABPM/UHM; Matthew Cardinal, ME; and Robert J. Snyder, DPM, CWS will present a poster abstract titled, “Delayed Progress in Wound Area Reduction After Four Weeks of Standard Care Predicts Failure to Heal Diabetic Foot Ulcers.” To better understand events that precede the failure to heal DFUs, despite early progress, investigators examined wound area measurements in 120 subjects who had achieved at least 50 percent area reduction of their DFUs following four weeks of conventional treatment. The abstract sheds light on the sub-clinical events that impact the healing of DFUs. The poster will be available for viewing throughout the duration of DF Con 2010. To view the complete abstract, visit: http://www.dfcon.com/abstracts.html.

DF Con 2010 will be held March 18 – 20, 2010, at the Renaissance Hollywood Hotel in Los Angeles. ABH will be exhibiting at Booth #304 in the Exhibitor Grand Ballroom.