Longitudinal Evaluation of Biomarkers in Wound Fluids from Venous Leg Ulcers and Split-thickness Skin Graft Donor Site Wounds Treated with a Protease-modulating Wound Dressing

Venous leg ulcers represent a clinical challenge and impair the quality of life of patients. This study exa-mines impaired wound healing in venous leg ulcers at the molecular level. Protein expression patterns for biomarkers were analysed in venous leg ulcer wound fluids from 57 patients treated with a protease-modu-lating polyacrylate wound dressing for 12 weeks, and compared with exudates from 10 acute split-thickness wounds. Wound healing improved in the venous leg ulcer wounds: 61.4% of the 57 patients with venous leg ulcer achieved a relative wound area reduction of ≥ 40%, and 50.9% of the total 57 patients achieved a relative wound area reduction of ≥ 60%. Within the first 14 days, abundances of S100A8, S100A9, neutrophil elastase, matrix metalloproteinase-2, and fi-bronectin in venous leg ulcer exudates decreased significantly and remained stable, yet higher than in acute wounds. Interleukin-1β, tumour necrosis factor alpha, and matrix metalloproteinase-9 abundance ranges were similar in venous leg ulcers and acute wound flu-ids. Collagen (I) α1 abundance was higher in venous leg ulcer wound fluids and was not significantly regu-lated. Overall, significant biomarker changes occurred in the first 14 days before a clinically robust healing response in the venous leg ulcer cohort.