LODZ, Poland and UNIVERSITI SAINS, Malaysia—Antibiotic resistance of bacteria is on the rise, which is creating an urgency to discover new alternative therapeutic agents. Honey possesses good therapeutic potential, including wound healing properties and antimicrobial activity. In one case, a 55-year-old woman with extensive phlegmonous and necrotic lesions of the abdominal integuments and the lumbar area following a traumatic colonic rupture was treated with Manuka honey wound dressings and the GENADYNE A4 negative pressure wound healing system (Med Sci Monit. 2010 Nov;16(11):CS138-42).
The application of the Manuka honey and the GENADYNE A4 negative pressure wound healing system in treating phlegmonous lesions of the abdominal integuments after rupture of the colon brought good effects, ultimately enabling skin autografting on the wound site and complete wound healing.
In a separate Malaysian study, tualang honey better controlled Pseudomonas aeruginosa and its wound contraction effects on full-thickness burn wound in vivo (BMC Complement Altern Med. 2010 Sep 3;10:480). A total of 36 female Sprague Dawley rats were randomly divided into three groups. Under anaesthesia, three full-thickness burn wounds were created on the dorsum of the rats. The full-thickness burn wounds were inoculated with a specific organism, namely Pseudomonas aeruginosa (n=12), Klebsiella pneumoniae (n=12) or Acinetobacter baumannii (n=12). The three burn wounds were dressed with Tualang honey, hydrofibre and hydrofibre silver, respectively. Swab samples were obtained every three day for quantitative and semi-quantitative microbiological analyses. Clinical assessments, including observations concerning the appearance and wound size, were measured at the same time.
There was a rapid 32.26 percent reduction in wound size by day six (p=0.008) in the Tualang honey-treated wounds, and 49.27 percent by day 15 (p=0.005). The wounds remained smaller by day 18 (p<0.032). Tualang honey-treated rats demonstrated a reduction in bacterial growth in Pseudomonas aeruginosa inoculated wounds (p=0.005). However, hydrofibre silver and hydrofibre-treated wounds are superior to honey-treated wounds with Acinetobacter baumannii (p=0.035). There was no statistical significant of antibacterial property in Klebsiella pneumonia inoculated wounds.