Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1951-06-14
Freeze-Drying Bones Preserve
Them for Crafts, Doctors Told

an important part in treatment
of wounded from Korea and in
any future war, it was reported
by Capt. F. p. Kreuz and Its.
G. w. Hyatt. Thomas c. Turner
land Andrew L. Bassett.
Naval medicine is again faced
with an influx of war wounded, %
they reported. Extensive re-
constructive surgery has been
necessary. The specific problems
of bone replacement and skin
|coverage of the large wounds sug-
'gested that stored bone and skin
would be useful"
Storage Time Originally Limited.
It was noted early, however,
that handling and shipping of
frozen bone was difficult and ex-
pensive and that the bone had a
limited storage time. For many
years plasma, engines and BAG
terra have been successfully pre-
served by drying from a frozen
state. Freeze-dried products can
be stored in containers at room
temperature and can be easily
shipped.
Crafts Of the freeze dried bone
first were made in dogs and COM
parsons made with other forms
OF CRAFTS. The results indicated
that frozen homogeneous and
freeze-dried homogeneous CRAFTS
heal in manner similar to frozen
autogenous CRAFTS but at slightly
slower rate. In some respects the
freeze-dried bone CRAFTS appeared
to be superior to those preserved
merely by freezing" Autogenous
bone is taken from some other
part of the patients body. Homo
genous bone is taken from another
subject.
Based on the dog experiments,
bones have been withdrawn from
the freeze-dried bank for use on
66 patients during the past few
months. OF these 80 have been
followed for an average of nine
months. Twenty eight were
classed as successful and only
four as failures.
The longest storage time for
bone used was 285 days. The
shortest was three days and the
average So days.
The Navy doctors also reported
development of a successful method
OF storing skin for prolonged Pc
RODS before using it in grating
operations. It is kept in a bal
anced salt solution to which has
been added penicillin and strepto-
mycin for control of bacteria.
Skin stored in this way up to a
maximum of 1885 days, they said.
has been grated in series of 81
patients-45 in head operations
and II in other cases where a large
area had been denuded by battle
wounds or frostbite. The gratis
have proved IS per cent successful
from the start.
American industry faces an al
most intolerable pension burden in
the next generation, the associa-
ton was told by DR.. S. Charles
Frenco, associate medical director
OF the Consolidated Edison Co. of
New York.
Life Expectancy Cited
He cited the increase in life ex-
pectancy since the turn of the
century. The number of persons
IS and over has quadrupled
whereas the population ais a whole
has only doubled. he said.
Today" he said. "one out of
IL persons is over IS years of age
BY 1875 this number will soar
to one out of every nine. The gan
between retirement and death
now stands at five and a half
years, about double the length
IN 1900. under the present trend
1t will have tripled by 1875.
Unless industrial retirement
policies are changed the individ-
ual worker will be faced with in
creased years of inactivity and
with a draStically reduced income
under conditions which are psy-
chologically and physically de-
generative. The fact now is widely
accepted that it is not a workers
chronological age which necessi- |
tates his retirement at IS, but
rather the physical disabilities
which normally accompany ad- 4
vanced age ;"