HOW SWEET IT IS: You can spread it on your peanut-butter-banana sandwich, and you can stir it in your tea. Now, you can use this healing substance on your wounds. Honey, an old remedy used in ancient Egypt up to 4,000 years ago, is now being utilized to help wounds that have trouble healing. Medihoney is made from a highly-absorbent, seaweed-based material full of manuka honey -- a potent type of honey that is helpful in killing germs and speeding up the healing process. Manuka honey can be found in Australia and New Zealand in the hives of certain bees that collect nectar from manuka. Medihoney was made in 2007 by a company known as Derma Sciences, Inc., which specializes in wound care products. It helps the healing process because of its moist environment and, due to its risk-free nature, can be used on any patient with a variety of wounds. It can help heal leg ulcers, second degree burns, diabetic foot ulcers as well as wounds from diabetes, metastasis disease and cancer. A relatively inexpensive substance, Medihoney is even being used in Middle Eastern clinics on wounded Iraqi children. Because it is a natural substance, it tends to cause fewer complications.

Due to the high concentration of molecules found within honey and its ability to suck up water, bacteria find it hard to live and replicate within honey. Medihoney adds something new to the equation. "It's a different type of honey in that it has actual bacteriocidal effects," Christopher Attinger, M.D., the director of the Georgetown Wound Healing Center in Washington, D.C., told Ivanhoe. "It kills bacteria because of some of the enzymes it has within it. It has the same hyperosmotic properties that normal honey does and also the ability to kill bacteria." Medihoney is packaged into a woven seaweed dressing, making it user-friendly and easy to place over an individual wounded area of the body. Derma Science, Inc.'s research has shown that many antibiotics have become ineffective in fighting pathogens, but Medihoney has been effective in fighting even drug-resistant bacteria such as MRSA and ERE. Dressings are most effective if they reduce wounds by between 10 percent and 15 percent each week. If the healing process is taking longer, a different dressing should be used.

WORKS WONDERS? For people like John Pennington, a 63-year-old man who suffered for over three years as a result of a lawn mower accdient, Medihoney is life-changing and life-saving. Pennington tried every treatment, but nothing seemed to heal the wound on his leg. Then he tried Medihoney. In just months, Pennington's wound shrunk over 95 percent. He is not the only one relying on honey to heal his ailments. A friend of Pennington's stepmother used honey for her wound, and only three weeks later it started healing.

FOR MORE INFORMATION
Division of Wound Healing
Georgetown University Hospital
Washington, D.C.
(202) 444-3059