Cancellous bone homograft storage with aluminium-polyethylene bags.

In order to transport and cryopreserve human tissues, it is essential to have an easy-to-use recipient where tissues can be kept in sterile conditions. Here we show the results obtained by using Macopharma's tissue freezing bags, an aluminium-polyethylene multilayer bag, in our tissue bank of the Centro Comunitario de Sangre y Tejidos de Asturias. Five hundred and twenty-seven cancellous bone homografts were obtained from hospitals located 120 km around our Bank. The homografts were submitted to bacteriological controls and sent to our bank in these bags. They were stored at -70 degrees C and sent in dry ice to about 50 hospitals, where the tissue was bacteriologically controlled and grafted. Furthermore, the behaviour of these bags at -140 degrees C (vapour nitrogen) or -196 degrees C (liquid nitrogen) was tested. Our results indicate that Macopharma aluminium-polyethylene bags are suitable for the transporting and cryopreserving of cancellous bone homografts. These bags could also be used for keeping tissues in nitrogen containers.