Calcium Hydride-Based Dressing to Promote Wound Healing

Wound microenvironment with excess reactive oxygen species (ROS) can significantly inhibit wound healing. Encouraged by hydrogen molecules (H-2) with effective ROS scavenging and calcium hydride (CaH2) with sufficient H-2 supply, the authors for the first time employed CaH2 as a therapeutic H-2 donor and starch as a diluent to construct CaH2 pulvis dressing for wound healing treatment. It has been found that CaH2 by generating H-2 exhibited excellent ROS scavenging performance, favorable for preserving the oxidative-stress-induced cell death. After being applied onto the skin wound, the CaH2 pulvis dressing with the unique ROS-scavenging ability can accelerate skin wound healing in healthy/diabetic mice (small animal models) and Bama mini-pigs (large animal model). Such CaH2 dressing can release H-2 to relieve the inflammation levels, decrease the secretion of pro-inflammatory cytokines, increase the infiltration of inflammation-suppressive immune cells, and promote the regeneration of new blood vessels and collagens, thereby accelerating wound healing. This work highlighted that the integration of anti-oxidation and anti-inflammation functions based on CaH2 dressing endowed it with a promising possibility for the treatment of inflammatory diseases.