![]() “The skin in the fish has epidermis, dermis, cutaneous layer, and so on, which is the same as in humans,” said Fertram Sigurjonsson, the founder and CEO of the fish skin biotech company, Kerecis. While fish and humans may be separated by hundreds of million years of evolutionary distance, it seems that skin didn’t change too much over the course of history. Arctic fish heal chronic woundsĮlectron microscope images of fish skin and human skin show that the two are quite similar. Fish skin, which would otherwise be thrown away when processing fish for food, also presents a sustainable treatment method that is accessible to communities around the world. Scientists and clinicians have used fish skin to treat intense burns and chronic diabetes wounds. Human skin for wound treatment is expensive, and to prevent disease transmission, it must be intensely processed with detergents that often remove many of the beneficial lipids that speed up healing.įish skin, with its surprising molecular similarity to human skin, low cost to obtain, and fast healing process, may be a better solution for treating some of the toughest wounds. During this process the recipient’s skin cells have a human skin scaffold on which to grow and differentiate, thus helping close the wound. The current gold-standard for healing serious wounds is a human skin graft. From Nordic cod to Egyptian tilapia, researchers around the world are studying the beneficial effects of fish skin for treating skin wounds.ĭamage to the skin can arise from any number of places: a deep cut, burn, or chronic wounds due to diabetes or limb amputation. "By better understanding what resources are needed to care for injured wildlife and what treatment techniques increase healing speed, we can make the most informed treatment decisions, reduce animals' time in captivity and provide guidance to other facilities caring for burned animals.The secret to wound healing may be swimming in the sea. ![]() "This treatment has the potential to be used successfully on all kind of burn patients, both domestic and wild," Clifford said. These newcomers also got the salve and tilapia treatment. Within weeks of capturing the first bear, the CDFW brought in two more animals with burnt paws: a pregnant black bear and a mountain lion. She also gave the bear an acupuncture treatment to help it bear the pain. "We expected the outer wrapping to eventually come off, but we hoped the tilapia would keep steady pressure on the wounds and serve as an artificial skin long enough to speed healing of the wounds underneath," Peyton said. (Image credit: California Department of Fish and Wildlife) The vets were concerned that the bear would try to chew off the tilapia-skin bandages, so they covered its feet with wrappings made of corn husks. However, because fish are part of bears' diets, she covered the tilapia skin with rice paper and corn husks to make it challenging for the bear to tear off and eat the bandages. In the bear's case, Peyton cut pieces of the tilapia skin to fit the bear's paws and sutured them over the bear's wounds while it was under anesthesia. "Collagen dressing, however, may avoid the need of skin grafting, and provides additional advantage of patients' compliance and comfort," the researchers wrote in the study. But a 2011 study, published in the Journal of Cutaneous and Aesthetic Surgery, showed that collagen dressings had some benefits, even though there was no significant difference in wound healing between 120 burn patients given either a collagen dressing or a conventional dressing. Food and Drug Administration for use on human burn victims. ![]() ![]() Tilapia bandages aren't approved by the U.S. Peyton said she used the bandages because fish skin is high in collagen, a structural protein found in skin. Peyton isn't the first to use tilapia skin on burn victims - doctors in Brazil use the treatment on human burn patients - but she's certainly the first doctor to try it on a veterinary patient, the CDFW said. Jamie Peyton, chief of integrative medicine at the University of California, Davis' Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital, a chance to try out the experimental treatment. The first such animal they spotted - an adult female black bear weighing about 200 lbs. ![]()
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