Long-term Microphysiological Sample Imaging for Evaluation of Polypharmacy in Liver

Introduction

DeLIVERY aims to build a radically new technology for personalized health care, which provides, for the first time, the possibility to investigate polypharmacy on individual patients.

Background

Polypharmacy is the effect that the many combinations and permutations of drug mixtures, which are typically prescribed to the chronically sick or the elderly population (e.g., painkillers, beta blockers, blood thinners, anti-depressants, and statins), have on the human body.

Polypharmacy is becoming a major issue in the ageing population, as well over 10% of hospital admissions for people over 60 years of age are due to currently unknown interactions of the multiple drugs being prescribed by the specialized physicians and general practitioners routinely visited by the elderly.

Current Challenges

Currently, no single platform exists that can be utilized in a highly parallelized fashion to monitor such effects at the cellular and tissue level.

DeLIVERY's Solution

DeLIVERY will provide an integrated microphysiological system (MPS) culture and microscopic imaging platform specifically for the purpose of maintaining, treating, and long-term imaging of patient-specific cells within their microenvironment.

This MPS platform will allow physicians, biomedical scientists, and researchers to determine the individual response of human tissue biopsies to a combination of multiple drugs.

Impact on Healthcare

DeLIVERY will enable individualized treatment options, providing essential tools towards a better quality of life for older people by allowing improved personalized healthcare.

Novel medicines with the potential to reverse the effects of ageing and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) will be tested within typical polypharmacy contexts to determine possible interactions, and the DeLIVERY MPS system will be the purpose-built platform to provide this service.

Future Directions

Such a system also requires a paradigm shift in microscopy - away from the single, bulky instrument providing one imaging modality towards compact and modular, yet still high-end, devices.