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Focus on Innovation:
The Use of Cryopreserved Skin as a Wound Dressing
 The Skin and Wound Allograft Institute is committed to constantly improving the treatment modalities of burn and wound patients. We employ the most advanced technology to ensure the best possible treatment of burn victims through the use of allograft biological dressings made of cryopreserved skin.
Cryopreserved skin has been used extensively in burn units for patients as a biological dressing. It has been proven to be an excellent wound covering, allowing for temporary closure of burn injuries up to 10 days post-burn.1 It also has been proven to be a very effective material in covering excised deep second and third degree burns when auto-grafting is not possible.2 Cryopreserved skin performs very well as both a mechanical and physiological barrier as its use decreases the loss of water, proteins and heat through the injury as well as protecting it from the elements and infection.
LifeNet Health recently helped create the Skin and Wound Allograft Institute (SWAI). The purpose of SWAI is to supply life-saving skin grafts for the most devastating traumatic burn injuries, while developing new technologies that will assist patients with non-healing wounds related to diabetes and surgical complications.
SWAI serves as a repository for donated human tissue awaiting distribution to major burn and wound centers in the United States. It also provides recovery training, processing services and regulatory guidance to organ procurement agencies and tissue banks.
To learn more about SWAI and the products and support programs it offers, please call 866-233-1001 or visit www.swai.org.
1. Performance and Safety of Skin Allografts, Hannah Ben-Bassat, PhD., Clinics in Dermatology (2005) 23, 365-375.
2. A historical appraisal of the use of cryopreserved and glycerol-preserved allograft skin in the treatment of partial thickness burns, A.F.P.M. Vloemans, E. Middelkoop, R.W. Kreis, Burns 28 (2002) S16-S20.
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