Devices and methods for treating tissue

Abstract

The present invention provides devices and methods for treating biological tissue. The treatment comprise implanting a scaffold implant device into in combination with a therapeutic material such as cells, tissue or cell components. The scaffold device serves to hold the therapeutic material at the treatment site, protecting it from being squeezed out by surrounding tissue. Additionally the scaffold device is believed to trigger an injury response that leads to angiogenesis in the tissue, which provides blood flow and nutrients to the associated therapeutic material to sustain it for a therapeutically effective amount of time. The devices may also be implanted at a tissue site already treated with a therapeutic material to initiate angiogenesis at the treatment site to sustain the material. The devices and methods also may be used to treat tumors with a necrosis factor.

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.