Its Not Just Honey - How Supplementing Medical Grade Honey With Antioxidants Can Positively Impact Wound Healing

Background: With the raised awareness and concern over antimicrobial resistance, medical-grade honey as a treatment modality has made a comeback, with increasing literature available on multiple honeys and derived wound care products. Honey's role in wound management has been established and reviewed in relation to multiple aspects, like antibacterial, anti-inflammatory and debriding action. With honey's overall efficacy seemingly attributable to synergistic effects of its intrinsic constituents, it would make sense to further extend the potential for synergy by introducing exogenous components to obtain superior results and optimize wound healing.

Purpose: A medical grade honey formulation (MGH+) containing honey supplemented with vitamins C and E has been used in the treatment of various wound types, including burns and diabetic ulcers, having demonstrated highly efficient results. Based on what is already known about honey and antioxidants alone, it can be suggested that this type of combination may translate into a significant improvement in wound care. The benefits of vitamins C and E are widely described, with proven synergy upon combination and may significantly impact the healing process by influencing aspects such as redox homeostasis and collagen synthesis.

Methods: An in vivo comparative account of honey alone versus honey supplemented with vitamin C to treat burns in guinea pigs yielded remarkable results. A metabolism dependent on ascorbic acid and uniform skin thickness made this an excellent animal model, allowing for potential extrapolation of results to human wounds.

Results: The data obtained from the study on vitamin C-supplemented honey and its superiority on wound parameters, coupled with the results from research with MGH+, have generated a new thought process regarding wound healing, which may include upgrading pre-existing therapies, in this instance, honey.

Conclusion: Through further studies, it may well be revealed that the solutions we are looking for are in simply perfecting the tools we already have.