An innovative Israeli-made wound dressing has been found to drastically stimulate the healing of diabetic wounds, a new study by physicians at the Rambam Health Care Campus in Haifa has found.
Copper Oxide Impregnated Wound Dressings, developed by Herzliya-based MedCu Technologies, have already received clearance by the major international regulatory bodies – including the United States’ FDA – for use in acute and chronic wounds.
“What is special about our dressing is that it contains particles of copper oxide,” said Dr. Gadi Borkow, MedCu’s co-founder and chief medical officer, who co-authored the study with the Rambam researchers.
Borkow noted that the advantage of copper is two-fold.
“Copper has a very powerful antimicrobial efficacy, it kills a wide-spectrum of pathogens, bacteria, fungi and viruses and therefore it helps clear the wound and protect it from infections,” he said.
“In addition, many do not know that copper is an essential element in human physiology, including in healing wounds,” he remarked.
Foot wounds or ulcers are very common among individuals who suffer from diabetes: About 15% of such patients experience them. They are commonly located at the bottom of the foot and have a high chance of infection or hospitalization. A high level of glucose in the blood can interfere in the healing.
Some 13 diabetic patients took part in the study. By the end of the treatment, the size of their wounds showed an average reduction of 65%. Improvement was registered in all wounds regardless of their initial size or other interfering factors, other than weight-bearing pressure.
The findings were published in the academic journal Medicina.
“The most frequent reason chronic wounds do not heal is that there is no production of new blood capillaries,” Borkow said. “Without new blood reaching the wound, there is a problem of lack of oxygen, no activation of the immune system, no removal of toxic waste.”
“Copper is essential for the production of new capillaries,” he added. “With our wound dressing, we are stimulating the process.”
Other forms of treatment currently available for diabetic wounds are often burdensome and painful, and sometimes require hospitalization.
MedCu wound dressings are already available and in use.
For the future Borkow said that they hope to launch a larger study, also with the goal of comparing the results between different forms of treatments.
“This past one was a small clinical trial, but our goal is to show the efficacy of our dressings in a larger, randomized one,” he said.