Dressing Material With Halochromic Dye as an Information Source in Wound Healing Monitoring

Background: The percentage of clean-wound infection remains fairly high so far: 2% to 5%. Therefore, monitoring wound healing is a critical task in modern surgery.

Objective: To develop and test a dressing material with halochromic dye in order to determine the suppuration of a clean wound of the skin and soft tissues.

Material and methods: The experiment was conducted on 30 Wistar rats: clean wounds were formed and then covered with a dressing soaked in halochromic dye. During the experiment, we measured the pH of the wounds and wound area and determined the qualitative and quantitative composition of the wound microflora. Statistical analysis was conducted using the Wilcoxon test; the level of significance was taken at 0.05.

Results: We found that the initial wound area was 253 (248; 257) mm² and the surface pH, 5.80 (5.55; 5.90). Clean wounds covered with a dressing material were not treated with medication. It led to their infection and a change in the color of the dressing material on average on day 4 (4; 5) of the experiment. After removal of the dressing material, we noted that the pH of the wounds was 7.79 (7.68; 7.88) and the wound area, 238 (234.3; 242.5) mm²; the differences compared with the data on day 1 were statistically significant. When analyzing the degree of wound contamination after removal of the dressing material, we found that the wound contained aerobic and anaerobic microorganisms and microscopic fungi, the level of which statistically significantly exceeded the maximum permissible level, confirming development of the wound infection.

Conclusions: The use of a dressing material with halochromic dye, which changes its color in response to the pH of the wound, facilitates timely detection of the development of the wound infection.

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