Two bone substitutes have recently made their debut in the marketplace.

One of them, called CarriGen, offers increased porosity and pore size and is the first highly porous bone-graft substitute that sets hard upon implantation, resulting in a complete fill. Manufactured by Etex Corp. (Cambridge, MA), it is a bone-void filler material that can be used in the pelvis, extremities, and spine.

“While a number of respective bone growth factors continue to populate the market landscape, none of them possess any intrinsic biomechanical characteristics, nor do they possess a biologically compatible scaffold that optimizes user handling and placement,” says Brian Ennis, Etex’s president and CEO. “Etex has devoted more than a decade of research efforts to formulate carrier technology for bone growth factors utilizing our clinically proven conductive scaffold in formats that combine easy mixing with extraordinary handling capabilities.”

The second, called Osbone, is a high-porosity material that can be used to fill defects or for bone augmentation in areas where a stable bedding is required for implants. It is manufactured by Curasan AG (Frankfurt, Germany), and, by virtue of its properties, is suitable for oral and maxillofacial surgery applications.

“With Osbone, we now have a next generation of fully synthetic hydroxyapatite that, in contrast to bovine materials, involves says Wolf-Dietrich Hübner, medical director at Curasan.