Ischemia and hypoxia in tissues have been known for many years to be deleterious to wound healing. There is a critical requirement for molecular oxygen during healing and the presence of sufficient oxygen is a controlling factor for tissue repair. Various studies have demonstrated that increased oxygen tensions are advantageous for healing and prevention of infection. Therox, Inc. has developed a patented technology, which can be used to produce super-saturated oxygen suspensions (SOS) that can deliver oxygen to hypoxic environments without effervescence. Since vascular supply of oxygen is not always available in a local wound area, additional oxygen could be highly beneficial for all types of wounds. The primary goals of this proposal are to: 1) determine stability and performance characteristics of super-saturated oxygen suspension (SOS) emulsion, 2) establish the extent to which the SOS emulsion at different doses permits oxygen to penetrate into wounded tissue and 3) measure its effect on the rate of epidermal resurfacing in an animal burn model. Successful development of a super saturated oxygen emulsion would have potentially important clinical applications to enhance the healing of a variety of wound types (i.e., acute, chronic and burn wounds).
A topical emulsion which can deliver oxygen into ischemic and normal wounds has many potential important commercial applications including treatment of burns, acute and chronic non healing wounds, i.e. venous and pressure ulcers.
