Described herein are medical film materials that incorporate one or more neuro-regenerative drugs into a polymer film. The polymer film includes a copolymer of lactide and caprolactone. The neuro-regenerative drug includes the macrolactam immunosuppressant FK506. The film is configured such that when placed under physiological conditions, the neuro-regenerative drug is released in an extended, substantially linear fashion for a period of at least 30 days.

Biologically activated ion-exchange polymer salts are made by exchanging biologically active ionic agents onto ion-exchange polymers. The activated polymers are uniquely surface active and stable to thermal degradation and chemical and other forms of decomposition. The activated ion-exchange polymer salts may be processed and combined with polymer precursors using novel methods and materials to produce stable, biologically activated polymer composites, including antimicrobial and antifouling polymer composites.

A biodegradable stent that is degraded in a living body includes a stent body that is made of a biodegradable material and is deformed to have an expanded diameter in the living body; and a biodegradable drug-coating portion formed on the stent body. The drug-coating portion is degraded, in an expansion retention period during which an expansion retention force (radial force) of the deformed diameter-expanded stent body that acts on an inner wall of a lumen thereof is maintained, and before 60% of a degradation period from indwelling of the stent body in the living body to complete degradation thereof elapses.

Methods for inhibiting stenosis, obstruction and/or calcification of a heart valve following implantation in a vessel having a wall are disclosed. In one aspect the method includes providing a bioprosthetic heart valve mounted on an elastical stent; treating the bioprosthetic heart valve with a tissue fixative; coating the stent and the bioprosthetic valve with a coating composition including one or more therapeutic agents; implanting the bioprosthetic valve into the vessel in a diseased natural valve site; eluting the coating composition from the bioprosthetic valve; and inhibiting stenosis, obstruction and/or calcification of the bioprosthetic heart valve by preventing the attachment of stem cells to the bioprosthetic heart valve, the stem cells circulating external and proximate to the bioprosthetic heart valve by activating nitric oxide production (i) in the circulating stem cells, (ii) in an endothelial cell lining covering the bioprosthetic heart valve tissue, (iii) or both.

In one embodiment, a drug delivery system and method provide a member including a combination of a drug substance and a polymer or other material, and an encapsulating layer formed in an outer surface of the member by gas cluster ion beam irradiation of the outer surface of the member, which encapsulating layer is adapted to determine one or more characteristics of the drug delivery system.

Provided is a drug-eluting coronary stent. In the drug-eluting coronary stent according to the present invention, electrospinning is used, thereby making it possible to precisely control a total content of an everolimus-based drug bound thereto and form a uniform layer in spite of not using a polymer causing late thrombosis, or the like.

The invention relates to a composition for the release of an active ingredient, comprising a porous matrix, a filled carrier in the matrix and the active ingredient in the carrier. The invention is suitable for the treatment of bone cancers.

Expandable elements having drug-delivery features and associated systems and methods are disclosed herein. In one embodiment, a drug-eluting stent includes a radially expandable cylindrical frame having a plurality of struts. The frame is transformable between a low-profile delivery state and an expanded deployed state. A plurality of drug-delivery features are carried by one of the struts and configured to deliver a drug to a treatment site within the patient or piercing through the tissue wall to break the constricting of the vessel wall inwardly. When the frame is in the expanded state within a body lumen of the patient, the drug-delivery features extend radially outwardly away from the strut and are configured to engage and, in some arrangements, pass through a wall of the body lumen.

Implants and methods for treating ocular disorders are provided. One method involves introducing an implant into an anterior chamber of an eye. The implant is implanted into eye tissue adjacent the anterior chamber such that a proximal end of the implant resides in the anterior chamber following implantation. A therapeutic agent is eluted from the implant into the eye. Desirably, the release of the therapeutic agent from the implant is controlled. The controlled release of the therapeutic agent can be at a chosen rate and/or for a selected duration which can be episodic or periodic. The therapeutic agent can be an antiproliferative agent, an anti-inflammatory drug, or a compound for treating glaucoma or ocular hypertension.

Once aspect of the present invention relates to methods of embolizing a vascular site in a mammal comprising introducing into the vasculature of a mammal a composition comprising an inverse thermosensitive polymer, wherein said inverse thermosensitive polymer gels in said vasculature, which composition may be injected through a small catheter, and which compsitions gel at or below body temperature. In certain embodiments of the methods of embolization, said composition further comprises a marker molecule, such as a dye, radiopaque, or an MRI-visible compound.