Thermal shock and antibiotic combinations for biofilm infections on medical implants

Americans receive hundreds of thousands of medical implants each year for a variety of purposes. Many of these implants serve life-saving functions, or improve quality of life. However, a life-threatening risk can arise when bacteria colonize the surface of a medical implant. Bacteria can form a biofilm infection, which acts as a resistance layer to antibiotics and the immune response of the host patient. The current standard of care is surgical removal of the implant and the surrounding tissue, with eventual reimplantation of a replacement device and twice the probability of infection. Thus, patients suffer through physical harm and poor quality of life, in addition to the high cost associated with these multiple invasive surgeries.

A promising heating technique under investigation is proposed to treat these infections locally (does not require surgery or replacement of the implant). Heat, using this technique, can be delivered remotely using an alternating magnetic field which induces heat on the outer surface of the implant where any infection would be. The required time and temperature to treat the three most common bacterial species in biofilm infections of medical implants were investigated in this work. The effect of using antibiotics with thermal shock on treating the biofilm infections was also investigated. The results suggested that thermal shock can successfully eliminate biofilms infections and using antibiotics during the treatment can dramatically reduce the required heating time and temperature. Findings from this work are crucial steps in the process of presenting this technique as an alternative treatment for implant infections, offering better quality of care with no further physical harm, in addition to saving the world billions of dollars each year.