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Timing is important to wound healing. Critically, the timing of wound re-epithelialization can decide the outcome of the healing. [11] If the epithelization of tissue over a denuded area is slow, a scar will form over many weeks, or months; [12] [13] If the epithelization of a wounded area is fast, the healing will result in regeneration.
A gorilla licking a wound. Wound licking is an instinctive response in humans and many other animals to cover an injury or second degree burn [1] with saliva. Dogs, cats, small rodents, horses, and primates all lick wounds. [2] Saliva contains tissue factor which promotes the blood clotting mechanism.
Injury in animals is damage to the body caused by wounding, change in pressure, heat or cold, chemical substances, venoms and biotoxins. Injury prompts an inflammatory response in many taxa of animals ; this prompts wound healing , which may be rapid, as in the Cnidaria .
A wound is any disruption of or damage to living tissue, such as skin, mucous membranes, or organs. [1] [2] Wounds can either be the sudden result of direct trauma (mechanical, thermal, chemical), or can develop slowly over time due to underlying disease processes such as diabetes mellitus, venous/arterial insufficiency, or immunologic disease. [3]
One of the best-understood roles for bioelectric gradients is at the tissue-level endogenous electric fields utilized during wound healing. It is challenging to study wound-associated electric fields, because these fields are weak, less fluctuating, and do not have immediate biological responses when compared to nerve pulses and muscle contraction.
For instance, in wound healing, P21 has been found to allow mammals to heal spontaneously. It even allows some mammals (like mice) to heal wounds without scars. [5] [6] The LIN28 gene also plays a role in wound healing. It is dormant in most mammals. [7] Also, the proteins MG53 and TGF beta 1 play important roles in wound healing. [8]
Macrophages are essential for wound healing. [64] They replace polymorphonuclear neutrophils as the predominant cells in the wound by day two after injury. [65] Attracted to the wound site by growth factors released by platelets and other cells, monocytes from the bloodstream enter the area through blood vessel walls. [66]
Research into hormones and wound healing has shown estrogen to speed wound healing in elderly humans and in animals that have had their ovaries removed, possibly by preventing excess neutrophils from entering the wound and releasing elastase. [26] Thus the use of estrogen is a future possibility for treating chronic wounds.