How an Ohio tissue bank is helping Hawai'i fire survivors

At least 12 burn patients with serious wounds from the devastating fires in Maui are being treated at Straub Medical Center in Honolulu, and some of them may be benefiting from skin grafts from a Dayton, Ohio, tissue bank.

Community Blood Center/Community Tissue Services (CBC/CTS) distributes skin allografts around the country, including to Straub, with the most recent delivery there sent in mid-July. An allograft is a temporary cover for burn wounds made of human skin, in this case from donors who are deceased.

"Our grafts are life-saving allografts," explains Sharon Smith, wound product manager with Community Tissue Services. "They're used as a temporary dressing on those patients to minimize fluid loss, maintain their body temperature, prevent infections, minimize inflammation, and help with the pain control."

At least three patients are known to have received allografts from the Dayton tissue bank, though the number could be higher. Straub's burn unit "is the only facility of its kind in Hawaii, and the only one in the North Pacific between California and Asia," according to The New York Times.

Smith tells WVXU that Community Tissue Services has been in contact with the Honolulu facility offering to send additional allografts, but as of Thursday morning, it has not requested more supplies.

At least 111 people have died since wildfires tore though Lāhainā and other parts of Maui. Some fires are still burning, but were 80% to 85% contained as of Thursday, according to Hawai'i Public Radio. The wildfires began Aug. 8 in several spots on Maui, and grew rapidly. It is the deadliest natural disaster in Hawai'i history.