Monitoring a wound for infection usually requires daily cleaning and replacement of bandages. But what if you could bandage a wound and then leave it to heal undisturbed? Scientists at Sheffield University are working on a special kind of dressing that would produce a pinkish glow when viewed under an ultraviolet light if there are in fact any harmful bacteria in the wound.
The researchers have developed polymers that more or less glow in the dark when bacteria is present. The key to this clever dressing is a new gel that contains molecules that will actually bind to bacteria and trigger the fluorescent dye that can then be seen under a UV light. As part of the project’s funding comes from the Defense Science and Technology Laboratory, which is an agency of the Ministry of Defense, the gel is expected to be taken full advantage of during operations where soldiers may be wounded, but have to continue being moved with little time for checking dressings.
Besides being used on the wounds of soldiers, the researchers intend the gel to be used by doctors treating chronic wounds like ulcers. The gel can also “rid a wound of up to 80 percent of the surface bugs in about three hours.” Normally, it can take a few days to find out if there are high levels of bacterial growth after taking swab samples and waiting for the bacteria culture to grow in the laboratory. The research team is confident that the gel will reduce the detection of bacterial infection to within a few hours or less.
Not only does the gel help identify bacteria and kill the surface bugs, it can also help reduce overusing antibiotics. The gel can inform doctors as to whether or not they should use antibiotics, and also what the best kind is to prescribe. Certain antibiotics can leave a patient feeling depleted and that overusing antibiotics can build your body’s resistance to the drug’s effects. Not needing to take as strong of a dose, or any antibiotics at all, could be very beneficial in the long term.
The researchers are hoping to start testing on patients with an early-stage clinical trial in the next two to three years. The dressing will be able to identify bacteria that cause legionella, salmonella, E. coli, MRSA, meningitis, C difficile, and peritonitis.
The idea of having a dressing react to infection isn’t a new one. Last year the Fraunhofer Research Institution for Modular Solid State Technologies EMFT in Munich created a new dye for plasters and bandages that changes color if infection is detected. With two teams now working on solutions, it shouldn’t be long before we see them available for mainstream use.