Advanced Transdermal Nanofiber Patch for Rapid Wound Repair

https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.18138157

Abstract

Wounds due to diabetic foot ulcers affect 6.3% of the global population. It present a serious challenge in wound healing which often leads to chronic, non-healing wounds and, in severe cases also amputation. These complications arise when blood supply is adequent which also makes traditional treatments less effective. Therefore, the aim of this study was to develop a nanofibrous patch for controlled transdermal drug delivery to effectively heal diabetic wounds. Two most important materials where used for sustained drug delivery i.e. polycaprolactone (PCL) and Bixin. PCL which is a biodegradable polymer with a slow degradation rate was used as the base material. Whereas, bixin was incorporated into the PCL nanofibers to bypass the gastrointestinal tract which can degrade orally administered drugs.

The electrospinning method was used to produce PCL and Bixin-loaded PCL sheets. After the designing of patch, the drug release was designed in two phases: an initial burst release followed by a sustained and gradual release over 14 days. To confirm the presence of Bixin in the PCL nanofibers sheet FTIR spectroscopy and X-ray diffractometry (XRD) was used. FTIR showed deeper valleys in the Bixin-loaded samples. Whereas, XRD provided additional evidence of successful drug incorporation.

The results demonstrated that Bixin-loaded PCL nanofibers significantly enhanced the wound healing process by as the drug relesaed in first 10 hours which accelerated tissue regeneration across all healing phases. It also showed that a sustained release reaching 100% over 14 days. The results suggest that when PCL is combined with Bixin these patches offer a promising approach for wound care.