الفهرس | Only 14 pages are availabe for public view |
Abstract Skin is the first line of defense in the body and can be easily injured with either external object or with internal blunt force trauma. There are many types of wound dressings with different properties and mechanism of action for accelerating healing. They may activate the wound repair, help in the skin regeneration process, provide the moisture environment for wound or help in its drying. Biomaterials, the non-drug biologically-derived materials have become very important means to treat, enhance or replace any tissue, organ or function in an organism based on their structural rather than biological properties. For viable translational outcomes, we considered that a hydrogel made of the 2 polymeric biomaterials; alginate and chitosan alone, with no additional growth factors, cytokines or cells would prove sufficiency to treat wound injuries and can act as a scaffold for activating cells migration and proliferation as well as promoting the angiogenesis. The present study aimed at preparing a new type of Alginate/ Chitosan PolyElectrolye Complex (PEC) hydrogel and testing the required wound healing properties of the hydrogel in vitro which were then tested in vivo with excisional acute wound models in rats and compared with those of a commercial cream dressing and non-treated wounded rats. The healing promoting effects were assessed using different methods including the quantification of expression of two angiogenesis-controlling genes (VEGF and vWF) and measurement of the wound closure rate % with histological examinations for skin and wounds beds. In addition, the effect of gel degradation in the body was monitored by routine measuring of kidney functions. The dressed wounds showed maintained suitable levels of the angiogenic genes for activating hemostasis and accelerating the angiogenic cascades for maintaining the blood supply to the newly formed skin tissue in the wound area. Accelerated rebuilding for the layers of wound area was observed proving efficiency of the hydrogel in the treatment of acute wounds and its role in the regeneration of the damaged skin tissues. The wound closure rate was faster with wounds treated with the chosen hydrogel than those treated with the cream and the non-treated wounds. |