A Prospective, Double-Blinded, Randomized Controlled Trial of dHACM for Incisional Hernia Prophylaxis

Overview

Currently, no standard of care exists to prevent incisional hernias (IH). This study will compare how frequently IH develop in standard abdominal closures vs. abdominal closures with dHACM added. By adding dHACM to the standard closure, we think we can reduce the formation of IH. If patients decide to participate in this study, they will be randomly assigned to one of two study arms, Arm A or Arm B. They will have a 50% chance of being assigned to either arm. The assignment will be made by computer program and is completely random. Patients are not informed of which arm they are assigned. Arm A (Treatment Arm): dHACM Patients enrolled in this arm will have a thin sheet of dHACM placed as an overlay over the length of the closed incisions. dHACM is Dehydrated Human Amniotic-Chorion Membrane. It is a FDA-registered healing adjunct that has been applied in a broad range of diseases including wounds, plantar fasciitis and burns. Arm B (Control Arm) Patients enrolled in this arm will have standard fascial closure. Data collection will be performed at routine follow-up outpatient clinic visits with the primary surgeon to assess for IH related symptoms. At 6 months after surgery, patients will see a surgeon who is blinded to the randomization. This surgeon will perform a painless handheld ultrasound examination of the incision site.

Two million laparotomies are performed annually in the United States (US). Following these surgeries, the incidence of new incisional hernias (IH) is estimated at 400,000 cases per year. These hernias are a major source of morbidity and mortality for patients, and they result in $6-10 billion per year in healthcare costs. Our multidisciplinary hernia prevention group has identified a novel IH prevention strategy in the form of dehydrated human amniotic-chorionic membrane (dHACM). We previously showed that dHACM prevents IH in animal models, and subsequently in a prospective cohort of high-risk patients. The purpose of this trial is to quantify the efficacy of dHACM in IH prophylaxis by performing a prospective, double-blinded randomized controlled trial. Our specific aim is to test the hypothesis that augmentation of standard abdominal fascia closures with prophylactic, onlay dHACM sheets without fixation will reduce IH formation in a high-risk population.