The Use of Dehydrated Human Amnion / Chorion Membrane Allograft to Reduce Pain and Accelerate Healing in Chronic Non-healing Post - Surgical Wounds

This abstract presents three cases of patients that had reduction in pain and accelerated wound healing after the use of dehydrated human amnion/chorion membrane (dHACM) allograft. The patients are female with ages 65, 75, and 89. All three patients had a chronic, non-healing post-surgical wounds present for longer than 6 weeks (for 2 of the patients) and 11 months for the third patient. Patient comorbidities include diabetes and peripheral artery disease in 1 case and venous stasis/venous insufficiency in 2 cases. Several advanced wound care dressings were used to enhance wound healing including silver alginate, Collagen, and porcine small intestine submucosa extracellular dressing, along with compression (in the venous stasis cases) with little improvement.  The patients had dHACM allograft applied to their non-healing wounds weekly by a wound care physician. The dHACM was placed on the wound by the physician, hydrated with normal saline, covered with non-adherent mesh dressing, secured with Steri-Strips, followed by a cover dressing. Dressings were left in place for 7 days. During weekly assessment, wound measurements and assessment were documented along with pain level.  Two patients reported their pain was 6 out of 10 and one patient 7 out of 10 on the pain scale prior to the first application of the dHACM. All three patients experienced less pain each week after the 1st application and all reported zero pain with complete wound closure after 4 weeks (4 applications).  In conclusion, the 3 patients in this case study experienced a reduction in pain and accelerated wound healing with the use of dHACM allograft.