In vivo – Wound healing studies of Leptospermum scoparium honey loaded chitosan bioactive wound dressing

The research aimed to develop a bioactive wound dressing using chitosan and Leptospermum scoparium honey, which is commonly known as Manuka Honey. The wound dressing was developed using solvent- casting technique with the honey as a drug. The wound healing ability of the developed dressing was evaluated against three different wound models namely excision, incision and burn wound model in terms of wound contraction percentage and histopathological examination. The results of the study revealed that the performance of the developed honey loaded chitosan dressing was comparable with commercial dressing. In the case of excision and incision wound models, complete healing was observed in on 18th day and in the case of burn wound model on 21 st day. The wound contraction percentage of CH dressed excision wound model is noted significantly better (0.05> p; 94%) than the commercial dressing (90%). In incision wound model, the tensile strength of healing skin was noted significantly higher (0.05> p) for CH dressed wounds than the commercial dressing. Similarly, for the burn wound also a significantly improved performance was noted it is noted (0.05> p; 96%) for CH dressing than the commercial dressing (85%). The results of the study indicated that the CH dressing have higher potential for the wound healing application.