Wound Treatment : An overview and initial investigation of wound care and bioactive materials

Sammanfattning: Wound care is a field with many treatment methods and products on the market. The healing period varies, some wounds become difficult to heal and chronic, in many cases a connection can be drawn to underlying diseases. Diabetes is a disease that could cause foot ulcers that are difficult to heal. Bioactive materials in wound care have not yet been studied to a greater extent, however it is of interest for development of new products with improved functions. Fibroblasts in the connective tissue have an important role in building and regenerating the tissue. Former studies show that the bio-ceramic calcium silicate (CS) induce tissue regeneration and promote reepithelization. It has also shown improvement of the biological functions of human epidermal stem cells and positive effects on cells in in vitro studies. The purpose of this project is to be a pre-study for further analysis of CS in wound care. The aim is to investigate additive material’s potential role in wound healing, one part will be a literature study to get an overview of the healing process of wounds and wound treatment. The other part of the study is based on three minor experiment to obtain information about how calcium silicate (CS) and CS/ β-tricalcium phosphate (β-TCP) effect human dermal fibroblasts. The method and results of literature study: The litterature study gathers information from literature and studies within the subject using the searchwords: wound, healing, biomaterials, calcium silicate, alamar blue, cell migration, recent trends, skin regeneration and diabetes. The results from the literature study demonstrates that the wound healing process is very complex and many factors must interact for good healing, some factors accelerate and inhibit healing. Furthermore, healing products with additives are already used for treatment of wounds with antibacterial and pain-relieving effects. However, only a little information about bioactive materials can be found which shows that there is lack of studies in this field. The method and results of experiments: Preparation of the two main samples: [1:10] CS in PBS together with pure water and [1:10] CS + β-TCP in PBS and pure water. The first experiment was the Inductively Coupled Plasma Optic Emission Spectroscopy (ICP-OES) made in an Optical Emission Spectrometer which detected the elements Ca 317,933 (mg/L) and Si 251,611 (mg/L) in the main samples. The second experiment was Alamar Blue which produce data about the cell survival in quantitative numbers to determine the toxicity of the diluted samples. One pre-test and two final tests (24 h apart) was made. The pre-test used the dilutions 1:2, 1:10, 1:100, and two Control Media, the pre-test indicated that CS diluted 1:2 is slightly toxic. The first final test used the dilutions 1:2, 1:10, 1:100, 1:1000, 1:10000 and one Control Media. The first final test indicated that CS diluted 1:2 is almost toxic. The second final used the dilutions 1:2, 1:10, 1:100, 1:1000, 1:10000 and one Control Media. The second final test indicated that CS diluted 1:2 is toxic. The third experiment was a Scratch Healing assay. This experiment struggled with learning how to count cells which made the analysis of this experiment difficult. The results of the Scratch healing assay shows cell migration through a before-picture right after the simulated scratch is made and a picture 24 hours after. In conclusion, two important parameters while investigating the direction of further research are toxicity and cell survival. CS as a bioactive material and additive in wound treatment could be possible but should be avoided when diluted 1:2 due to its toxicity shown in the Alamar blue test. The scratch healing assay showed that the fibroblasts migrate to some extent while interacting in solutions of CS.