PhD students from the Warsaw University of Technology (PW) have developed a solution that makes recovery from a broken limb shorter and less arduous. They decided to use printed electrostimulation layers in their PulseLAYERS project.

The solution of the doctoral students from the Warsaw University of Technology makes it possible to reduce the atrophy of the patient’s muscles during the fractured limb’s fusion and enables the cumbersome and difficult rehabilitation process to be kept to a minimum. ‘It also reduces the risk of complications related to bone fusion and accelerates healing’, reports Dominik Baraniecki, team leader.

PulseLAYERS takes the form of an overlay – a specialised dressing worn over the fracture site. It contains sensors (temperature and pressure) and electrodes responsible for electrostimulation. The developers of the idea use printed electronics, an increasingly popular method of manufacturing electronic components on various substrates. This method requires the development of detailed pastes, but is efficient and has a very wide range of applications.