35-3 Cutting-Edge CAMPs: What does the Future Hold?

EDITORIAL

What if you had a tool in your armamentarium that has repeatedly been shown to improve wound healing rates and patient quality of life? How would you use it? Hard-to heal wounds – those that do not exhibit normal physiology or heal in an expected amount of time with standard wound care including debridement, compression, and off-loading – are a burden to the patient, clinician and the healthcare system. In the field of wound care, advanced therapies such as skin substitutes, also referred to as cellular tissue products (CTPs) with the updated nomenclature of CAMPs (cellular, acellular and matrix-like products), have been shown to improve healing rates, increase patient function and decrease amputations.

As of late, CAMPs product use has been in the spotlight, and not necessarily for all the good they can do for the at-risk patients we treat on a daily basis. Reports of overuse and abuse have led to increased scrutiny of CAMPs use, even prompting audits across the continuum of care. In November of 2024, all seven Medicare Administrative Contractors (MACs) finalized a change to their individual Local Coverage Determinations (LCDs) focusing on CAMPs use in diabetic foot and venous leg ulcers. After an evidentiary review of published literature and available medical evidence, the MACs have updated the LCD restricting coverage of CAMPs products, and limit applications to a total of eight per 16-week wound duration. With the date of adoption of these policies looming in February 2025, the ways that podiatrists and wound care clinicians use CAMPs may be substantially impacted.

In this edition of FAQ, we focus on the best practices around CAMPs use while highlighting key advancements made in the space of tissue engineering. In this publication, we cover a wide range of topics including the compliant use of CAMPs, pearls for appropriate charting for medical necessity, justification of product costs, advancements in tissue engineering, unique and emerging CAMP formulations, and promising research in alternative outcome measures such as tissue durability, cosmesis and bacterial modulation. After diving into the content of this issue, I sincerely hope that you leave with a strong foundation on how to best use CAMPs products in your practice, and a sense of excitement for the product innovations that are currently in the pipeline.

Windy Cole, DPM, CWSP