FIBRINOGEN PROTEIN BINDING EVALUATION OF EASTMAN TRITAN~(TM ) COPOLYESTERS AND OTHER POLYMERS FOR MEDICAL APPLICATIONS

摘要

Medical devices in contact with blood require engineering plastics with reduced or negligible thrombosis or blood clotting properties. Other than the blood itself and the flow rate, the material is one of the most important variables affecting blood coagulation. A relatively new family of engineering plastics is Eastman TritanTM copolyester, which offers significant advantages to the medical industry due to excellent optical clarity before and after radiation sterilization, toughness, and chemical resistance to a variety of medical disinfectants and oncology drugs. In this paper, we describe a fibrinogen ELISA testing protocol that was developed to evaluate the fibrinogen binding behavior of various commonly used plastics including Tritan copolyesters. Surface-adsorbed fibrinogen directs cell adhesion and therefore plays a crucial role in thrombosis formation. These studies illustrate that Tritan MX731 and MX711 copolyesters exhibit low fibrinogen adsorption, indicating potential for reduced thrombosis compared to other engineering plastics.