Method for eradicating infectious biological contaminants in body tissues

Claim 1

A method for eradicating infectious pathogenic biological contaminants from body fluid outside the body prior to introduction of the decontaminated body fluids into the body of a patient, said method comprising: admixing an effective, non-toxic amount of a photoactive compound with the body fluid to produce a resulting body fluid, the photoactive compound having an affinity to be selectively bound to the contaminants; maintaining the resulting body fluid in a suitable container in which there is no net mass transfer; and irradiating the resulting body fluid in the container with an effective level of essentially uniform intensity of radiation in the region of the visible spectrum, with a wavelength range of from about 400 nm to about 1000 nm, for an effective period of time such that the radiation penetrates the resulting fluid and exposes the photoactive-compound-bound contaminants to the radiation so as to eradicate such contaminants while maintaining the viability of said body fluids to produce viable decontaminated body fluids.

Claim 2

A method for eradicating infectious pathogenic biological contaminants from body fluid outside the body prior to introduction of the decontaminated body fluids into the body of a patient, said method comprising: admixing an effective, non-toxic amount of a photoactive compound with the body fluid to produce a resulting body fluid, the photoactive compound having an affinity to be selectively bound to the contaminants; maintaining the resulting body fluid in a suitable container in which there is no net mass transfer; and irradiating the resulting body fluid in the container with an effective level of essentially uniform intensity of radiation in the region of the visible spectrum, with a wavelength range of from about 400 nm to about 1000 nm, for an effective period of time such that the radiation penetrates the resulting fluid and exposes the photoactive-compound-bound contaminants to the radiation so as to eradicate such contaminants while maintaining the viability of said body fluids to produce viable decontaminated body fluids.

Claim 24

A method for externally purifying a blood product to eradicate pathogenic biological contaminants selected from the group consisting of envelope-containing viruses, bacteria, malarial, and trypanosomal parasites prior to introduction of the decontaminated blood products intravenously into a patient, said method comprising: admixing an effective amount of a photoactive compound with the blood products to bind the contaminant with the photoactive compound, said photoactive compound comprising a mixture of porphyrins, at least a portion of the molecules of said porphyrin mixture having the molecular formula: ##STR3## said molecules with said formula being fluorescent, photosensitizing, having the capability of selectively binding to said pathogenic biological contaminants, forming a high molecular weight aggregate with absorption peaks in the visible spectrum in water at approximately 365, 505, 537, 575, and 615 nanometers, absorption peaks in the infrared spectrum at approximately 3.0, 3.4, 6.4, 7.1, 8.1, 9.4, 12 and 15 microns, absorption peaks in carbon-13 nuclear magnetic resonance study at at least approximately 9.0, 18.9, 24.7, 34.5, 62, 94.5, 130-145 , 171.7 ppm relative to a 37.5 ppm resonance peak of dimethyl sulfoxide and additional absorption peaks in carbon-13 nuclear magnetic resonance study at approximately 27.9 ppm and 68.4 ppm relative to the resonance peak of tetramethylsilane in deuterated chloroform solvent; and at least 50 percent of the porphyrins in said mixture being of said molecules having said molecular formula; maintaining the blood product containing the porphyrins-bound contaminants in a suitable container, exposable to a radiation source capable of irradiating the blood product and in which there is no net mass transfer; and irradiating the blood product in the container with an essentially uniform intensity of radiation source in the region of visible spectrum, with a wavelength of from about 400 nm to about 1000 nm for an effective period of time to permit the radiation to penetrate through the blood product in the container and eradicate the contaminants while maintaining the viability of components in said blood product.

Claim 25

A method for externally purifying a blood product to eradicate pathogenic biological contaminants selected from the group consisting of envelope-containing viruses, bacteria, malarial, and trypanosomal parasites prior to introduction of the decontaminated blood products intravenously into a patient, said method comprising: admixing an effective amount of a photoactive compound with the blood products to bind the contaminant with the photoactive compound, said photoactive compound comprising a mixture of porphyrins, at least a portion of the molecules of said porphyrin mixture having the molecular formula: ##STR3## said molecules with said formula being fluorescent, photosensitizing, having the capability of selectively binding to said pathogenic biological contaminants, forming a high molecular weight aggregate with absorption peaks in the visible spectrum in water at approximately 365, 505, 537, 575, and 615 nanometers, absorption peaks in the infrared spectrum at approximately 3.0, 3.4, 6.4, 7.1, 8.1, 9.4, 12 and 15 microns, absorption peaks in carbon-13 nuclear magnetic resonance study at at least approximately 9.0, 18.9, 24.7, 34.5, 62, 94.5, 130-145 , 171.7 ppm relative to a 37.5 ppm resonance peak of dimethyl sulfoxide and additional absorption peaks in carbon-13 nuclear magnetic resonance study at approximately 27.9 ppm and 68.4 ppm relative to the resonance peak of tetramethylsilane in deuterated chloroform solvent; and at least 50 percent of the porphyrins in said mixture being of said molecules having said molecular formula; maintaining the blood product containing the porphyrins-bound contaminants in a suitable container, exposable to a radiation source capable of irradiating the blood product and in which there is no net mass transfer; and irradiating the blood product in the container with an essentially uniform intensity of radiation source in the region of visible spectrum, with a wavelength of from about 400 nm to about 1000 nm for an effective period of time to permit the radiation to penetrate through the blood product in the container and eradicate the contaminants while maintaining the viability of components in said blood product.

Claim 44

A method for extracorporeal treatment of the blood of a patient infected with infectious pathogenic biological contaminants said method comprising; removing blood from the body of a patient infected with infectious pathogenic biological contaminants; adding to said blood an effective, non-toxic amount of photoactive compound having an affinity to be selectively bound to the infectious contaminants; maintaining said treated blood in a suitable container in which there is not net mass transfer; irradiating said contaminated blood admixed with photo-active compound in the container with an effective level of essentially uniform intensity of radiation in the region of visible spectrum, with a wavelength range of from about 400 nm to about 1000 nm, for an effective period of time such that the radiation penetrates the blood and exposes the photoactive-compound-bound infectious contaminants to the radiation so as to eradicate such infectious contaminants while maintaining the viability of components in said blood to produce a viable and decontaminated blood; and returning said viable and decontaminated blood to the patient's body.

Claim 45

A method for extracorporeal treatment of the blood of a patient infected with infectious pathogenic biological contaminants said method comprising; removing blood from the body of a patient infected with infectious pathogenic biological contaminants; adding to said blood an effective, non-toxic amount of photoactive compound having an affinity to be selectively bound to the infectious contaminants; maintaining said treated blood in a suitable container in which there is not net mass transfer; irradiating said contaminated blood admixed with photo-active compound in the container with an effective level of essentially uniform intensity of radiation in the region of visible spectrum, with a wavelength range of from about 400 nm to about 1000 nm, for an effective period of time such that the radiation penetrates the blood and exposes the photoactive-compound-bound infectious contaminants to the radiation so as to eradicate such infectious contaminants while maintaining the viability of components in said blood to produce a viable and decontaminated blood; and returning said viable and decontaminated blood to the patient's body.

Claim 68

A method for extracorporeal treatment of the blood of a patient infected with infectious pathogenic biological contaminants said method comprising: administering to the patient infected with infectious pathogenic foreign biological contaminants an effective, non-toxic amount of photoactive compound having an affinity to be selectively bound to the infectious contaminants; waiting a period of time for the photoactive compound to be taken up by the blood; removing the blood from the body of the patient; maintaining the blood in a suitable container in which there is no net mass transfer; irradiating the blood admixed with photoactive compound in the container with an effective level of essentially uniform intensity of radiation in the region of visible spectrum, with a wavelength range of from about 400 nm to about 1000 nm, for an effective period of time such that the radiation penetrates the blood and exposes the photoactive-compound-bound infectious contaminants to the radiation so as to eradicate such infectious contaminants while maintaining the viability of components in said blood to produce a viable and decontaminated blood; and returning the viable and decontaminated blood to the patient's body.

Claim 69

A method for extracorporeal treatment of the blood of a patient infected with infectious pathogenic biological contaminants said method comprising: administering to the patient infected with infectious pathogenic foreign biological contaminants an effective, non-toxic amount of photoactive compound having an affinity to be selectively bound to the infectious contaminants; waiting a period of time for the photoactive compound to be taken up by the blood; removing the blood from the body of the patient; maintaining the blood in a suitable container in which there is no net mass transfer; irradiating the blood admixed with photoactive compound in the container with an effective level of essentially uniform intensity of radiation in the region of visible spectrum, with a wavelength range of from about 400 nm to about 1000 nm, for an effective period of time such that the radiation penetrates the blood and exposes the photoactive-compound-bound infectious contaminants to the radiation so as to eradicate such infectious contaminants while maintaining the viability of components in said blood to produce a viable and decontaminated blood; and returning the viable and decontaminated blood to the patient's body.