AUTHOR=Sivaraj Dharshan , Noishiki Chikage , Kosaric Nina , Kiwanuka Harriet , Kussie Hudson C. , Henn Dominic , Fischer Katharina S. , Trotsyuk Artem A. , Greco Autumn H. , Kuehlmann Britta A. , Quintero Filiberto , Leeolou Melissa C. , Granoski Maia B. , Hostler Andrew C. , Hahn William W. , Januszyk Michael , Murad Ferid , Chen Kellen , Gurtner Geoffrey C. TITLE=Nitric oxide-releasing gel accelerates healing in a diabetic murine splinted excisional wound model JOURNAL=Frontiers in Medicine VOLUME=10 YEAR=2023 URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/medicine/articles/10.3389/fmed.2023.1060758 DOI=10.3389/fmed.2023.1060758 ISSN=2296-858X ABSTRACT=Introduction

According to the American Diabetes Association (ADA), 9–12 million patients suffer from chronic ulceration each year, costing the healthcare system over USD $25 billion annually. There is a significant unmet need for new and efficacious therapies to accelerate closure of non-healing wounds. Nitric Oxide (NO) levels typically increase rapidly after skin injury in the inflammatory phase and gradually diminish as wound healing progresses. The effect of increased NO concentration on promoting re-epithelization and wound closure has yet to be described in the context of diabetic wound healing.

Methods

In this study, we investigated the effects of local administration of an NO-releasing gel on excisional wound healing in diabetic mice. The excisional wounds of each mouse received either NO-releasing gel or a control phosphate-buffered saline (PBS)-releasing gel treatment twice daily until complete wound closure.

Results

Topical administration of NO-gel significantly accelerated the rate of wound healing as compared with PBS-gel-treated mice during the later stages of healing. The treatment also promoted a more regenerative ECM architecture resulting in shorter, less dense, and more randomly aligned collagen fibers within the healed scars, similar to that of unwounded skin. Wound healing promoting factors fibronectin, TGF-β1, CD31, and VEGF were significantly elevated in NO vs. PBS-gel-treated wounds.

Discussion

The results of this work may have important clinical implications for the management of patients with non-healing wounds.