I have become very familiar with the chronic wounds that folks with diabetes manifest lately. Given they have poor circulation in their legs and feet, the ability of these folks to heal their wounds is greatly diminished. ( Foot ulcers prevail in about 10% of all adults, and about ¼ of all type II diabetes patients.)
Treatment of these wounds require cleaning and administration of antibiotics to kill any present microbes and prevent the wound from festering.
Dr. David Thomas (Cardiff University, UK), along with 19 team members (two from QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute in Brisbane, Australia; one from QBiotics Group in Yungaburra, Australia; and one from Swansea University, UK) decided to see if the sap from the blushwood tree (Fintainea picrosperma) would have some value in treating the wound. This Australian tree had already been found to have promise in treating cancers. In particular, the identified EBC 1013 molecule, a component of the sap, was thought to have promise in wound treatment.
Using dairy calves as the subject animal, they found that 75% of the wounds were healed within 28 days. (Only 25% of the untreated wounds healed.) When the compound was then tested on mice, five of the 7 animals were completely healed, while none of the untreated wounds in the 7 other mice manifested any improvement.
The issue is that the bacteria in wounds typically form a sticky mesh called a biofilm. These aggregations are resistant to antibiotics, making chronic wounds difficult to treat.
The sap compound has two modes of action. First, it targets the structure of the biofilm, which is the extracellular polymeric matrix that the microbial infestation forms. These biofilms are generally difficult to be treated by antibiotics themselves, but this sap disrupts the biofilm. The secondary action, the added benefit, is the promotion of skin healing, as the EBC1013 induces the formation of inflammatory cells and proteins that promote healing.
The results are published in the article, Topical, immunomodulatory epoxy-tiglianes induce biofilm disruption and healing in acute and chronic skin wounds, found in Science Translation Medicine.
Diabetes is a nasty, nasty disease. My Dad had it (diagnosed when he was 48, during a hospitalization for pneumonia). And contrary to popular belief, you don’t have to be overweight. (He never was.) I can applaud anything that will treat these foot wounds.
I agree with all of those points, Alana. And, I am excited that this sap may able to sap the virulence of those wounds.