Skin grafts are often used to facilitate healing and closure of chronic wounds resulted from certain diseases such as diabetes. Apart from dehydrated human amnion/chorion membrane allograft (dHACM), fish skin xenografts from North Atlantic Cod have recently emerged as a novel and promising option in healing chronic wounds. A recent study demonstrated fish skin xenografts significantly accelerated the healing of acute full-thickness wounds which imitated chronic wounds compared to dHACM while the number of adverse reactions were similar. The superior wound healing property of fish skin xenografts may be attributed to its higher proportion of omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids and gentle processing which preserves the structural and molecular components beneficial to wound healing. Besides, the cost of healing with dHACM was 76% higher than fish skin xenografts, making the latter a more cost-effective alternative in a chronic setting.

Keyword: wound healing, membrane allograft, fish skin xenografts, omega-3

Reference

Kirsner et al. Wound Repair Regen. 2020;28(1):75-80.