Cow Bones Could Offer Cheap Alternative For Human Jaw Repair, Dental Treatment, Researchers Say

Checkpoint
RNZ’s weekday drive-time news programme from
4-6pm

Left
over cow bones could offer a more cost-effective way to
build back human jaws, after successful trials
overseas.

Otago University scientists are working on
ways to use minerals in the bones for medical and dental
bone grafts.

Grafts were often taken from somewhere
else on a patient’s body to help repair gaps or holes left
by the removal of tumours, often requiring multiple
surgeries, and raising costs.

However, scientists have
developed a method to extract hydroxyapatite from cow bone,
and use it as a scaffolding to help promote new
growth.

Researcher Jithendra Ratnayake told
Checkpoint it was the same mineral found in human
bone and teeth.

“We remove all the fats and the
collagen and proteins, and the remaining structure is called
hydroxyapatite, which is the mineral and that helps with
bone growth,” he said.

Ratnayake said the method they
had developed to extract the mineral was simple and
green.

Hardly any chemicals were used to remove all
the fats and the proteins, he said.

“If the cow has
mad cow disease, the method that we use will kill the prions
as well, which causes mad cow disease,” he said.

“Once
it’s processed, it’s completely safe to put it in humans
because all the collagens, the proteins and the fats, that’s
completely gone.”

Ratnayake said sometimes when a
wisdom tooth was removed, part of the bone was as well, and
to replace that, a scaffold-like material was
needed.

He said the hydroxyapatite – which he
described as a pure white colour block with lots of pores –
could do just that.

“Say you removed your wisdom
tooth; you have to remove some of part of your jawbone, as
well because of the extraction.

“You put this bone
graft material and what happens is bone cells will come into
the new material. The bone cells will attach, they will
differentiate, they will proliferate.

“And it starts
secreting new bone because of the growth of blood vessels
coming into that area.”

Ratnayake said it was
extremely cheap to produce.

“Imagine if you’re taking
it from the same person, that person [will] have to go
through two surgeries. So, this limits the where you need to
do two surgeries,” he said.

“It doesn’t need any other
surgeries. It’s readily available, and because of the porous
structure, it helps the blood vessels to grow into the area
and bone cells to attach and proliferate.”

He said
there were synthetic alternatives already on the market, but
they were quite expensive.

It also didn’t have that
extreme porous architecture, he said.

Ratnayake said
they had tested their method on 300 patients in
India.

“We got a patent as well. The patent is owned
by the Indian company. So, they are the ones who are doing
the human trials through the company,” he said.

“And
there’s about 300 cases which has been done. Everything has
been quite successful. We haven’t had any adverse reactions
or anything.”

He said the company had hoped to develop
the product and market it in South Asia and the Middle
East.

He said it was up to the company if it would
ever come to New
Zealand.

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