Upcycling: it’s keeping femoral heads and placentas out of landfill while providing surgeons with gold-standard void fillers and dressings.

It’s a grief-free process for the living donors and is managed rigorously by the Australian Tissue Donation Network.

Deb Stracey, former registered nurse and chief executive of the Australian Tissue Donation Network, joins us in The Tea Room this week.

Ms Stracey talks us through the lab process of turning femoral heads into “crunch”, which is prized by orthopaedic surgeons as a “gold standard” void filler. The amnion in placentas is also sought after by surgeons for intraoperative dressings.