When helping was critical, the AlloSource team sprang into action.

AlloSource is one of the largest suppliers of allograft skin for burns in the nation. Burn skin is central to our mission and helps us play a part in saving people’s lives each and every day.

We service major medical centers in our core communities as well as in other communities across the nation and AlloSource is first to get the call when a crisis event happens. On January 26 we got the call again.

U.S. Air Force C-130 airplanes landed in Tampa, Florida last week with severely burned survivors of the Haitian earthquake inside. The patients were immediately transferred to Tampa General Hospital, one of our large allograft burn skin customers. The procurement coordinator at Tampa General was looking for all the skin that we could provide them to cope with their immediate and future needs. Tampa has implemented their disaster plan for burns and is now working around the clock on surgeries in the burn center.

Immediately the AlloSource team sprang into action releasing 55 square feet of skin. The medical records team, PC and quality worked to clear multiple donors which allowed us to have two major shipments to Tampa general on Wednesday and Thursday to help them through their weekend surgeries. Customer service and distribution did incredible work picking the orders and getting them to Tampa in a timely manner. Operations is looking at their capabilities and is ramping up to be able to process the additional donors that we hope to receive. Medical records, PC and quality are looking at system changes to be able to release skin ahead of the rest of the donor. We are also exploring the ability to release skin under an “emergent need” basis, much like we release fresh skin or cartilage. In short, the AlloSource team once again put our mission into action doing everything we could for people in dire need.

None of this could have been possible without our OPO partners jumping on board as well. Thank you for your immediate response to this crisis. It has saved lives. We will continue to call on you to help us with the situation as it progresses. For the next 30-60 days please send all shipments of split thickness burn skin to AlloSource to continue to help with this humanitarian crisis.

AlloSource and our committed OPO members met our mission objectives we were able to positively help some of the victims of this terrible crisis. We continue to stay very close to the people at Tampa General regarding their allograft skin needs and remain ready to assist them in any way possible. We will keep you posted on the situation.

Or, learn more about skin allografts used for the treatment of burns, including function, structure, donor recovery and clinical application.

The following byline from AlloSource has appeared in hundreds of media outlets around the country

Amidst the constantly changing world of medicine, innovative research from some of the world’s leading surgeons is finding new ways to use donated human tissue to treat a host of medical conditions.

Registered donors and their families donate this allograft tissue in the same way organs are donated. It is used in many life-saving and enhancing medical procedures already, with numerous new opportunities on the horizon.

“Many people don’t realize it, but donated human tissue is used in many surgical applications, saving peoples’ lives and limbs daily,” says Dr. Ross Wilkins from the Denver Clinic for Extremities at Risk, a highly specialized group in the management of conditions and diseases that place people at risk of losing a limb. “Allograft tissue is used to replace damaged structures in the body, from the ligaments and tendons of major league sports players, bones and joints of military men and women, to the musculoskeletal structures, teeth, skin and spinal components of average citizens.”

AlloSource, one of the nation’s largest accredited tissue processing facilities, recently provided tissue to a man severely injured on a construction site. After a crane on the site hit a power line, Manuel Salazar was struck by 150,000 volts and was severely burned and lost both arms and both legs. First, allograft skin was used to cover his severe burns, then allograft bone and tissue were used to help build him a new arm and shoulder, so he could be successfully be fitted for a prosthetic arm and once again complete everyday tasks such as brushing his teeth and scratching his head.

“Donated human tissue has completely changed my life,” says Salazar. “Although I was forever changed by my accident, the new possibilities that allograft tissue have provided for me have restored my hope.”

On New Years Day Salazar will be sponsored by AlloSource to appear in the 2010 Rose Parade aboard the Donate Life float entitled New Life Rises. Salazar will join 23 other riders representing millions of people touched by organ and tissue donation, including donor families, living donors, transplant recipients and transplant candidates.

Dr. Wilkins and plastic surgeon Dr. William Brown operated on Salazar and have innovative surgeries for many patients using human allograft tissue for promoted healing, growth or reconstruction.

“The possibilities for the use of human tissue in modern medicine are truly thrilling,” Wilkins says. “Soon, we will know more about the growth biology of the human body, about regenerating bone and tissue and using donor stem cells to re-grow physical structures. We’ll have more of the information we need to achieve long-term success with groundbreaking procedures such as full limb transplantation.”

Currently, physicians of different specialties are working together to solve some of the most difficult issues in limb reconstruction. Surgical teams from the Denver Clinic for Extremities at Risk and Colorado State University Animal Cancer Center have devised a method for live, full joint transplants. Additional work is needed to learn how to safely block rejection.

“As more people learn about these remarkable discoveries and choose to be tissue donors, we will be able to find new ways to maximize those gifts and surgical teams will be able to provide patients with restored function and movement we only dream about today,” says Thomas Cycyota, chief executive officer of AlloSource.