This Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project will investigate novel approaches for biopolymer materials that uniquely enable oxygen incorporation into hydrogel dressings to improve and accelerate chronic wound healing. The proposed work differs drastically from other research programs and commercial efforts to use oxygen in chronic wound healing as it is the first to combine oxygen, a moist and clean healing environment, and antimicrobial properties into one cost-effective and easy-to-use product. Current commercial oxygen-delivery therapies for wound care, e.g., hyperbaric oxygen chambers and topical oxygen devices, are intermittent, inconvenient to use, and require access to expensive specialized equipment. Successfully introducing oxygenating wound dressings to the market will allow addressing the serious and pervasive burden on healthcare facilities and the exorbitant costs associated with chronic wound care. In the USA alone, diabetic chronic wounds cause direct healthcare-related costs of $1.5 billion and total direct and indirect costs of $20 billion. The proposed research incorporates proprietary patent-pending biopolymer materials and processing methods to create oxygenating hydrogels that can be made into wound dressings. The dressings have the unique potential to provide uniform and tunable oxygenation to heal chronic wounds. Dressing embodiments, syntheses, and manufacturing techniques will be explored to improve product performance and characteristics, reduce costs, and demonstrate commercial feasibility and viability of the production process. Thus, knowledge of biomaterials for wound care will be significantly advanced by the proposed research. Prototype wound dressings will be characterized and tested based on customer requirements.
