Study Starts to Determine Best Wound Healing Agents

How often do you see ads promoting an ointment as the wonder tonic for healing wounds on horses? How well do they really work? A study just underway in the United Kingdom will investigate and measure the actual healing properties of products designed specifically for horses. Dr. Mike Rose from the Institute of Rural Sciences at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth has been awarded a hefty grant for his study.

According to Dr. Rose, “Horses are prone to incurring lower limb wounds, and these wounds tend to be slow to heal. This is because of the nature of the environment in which horses live and work, as well as the poor ability of leg skin tissue to heal. Currently, there are a large number of products – over 100 – available on the market in the UK that purport to promote wound healing in horses, though the efficacy of only a small number of these has undergone adequate testing.”

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The plant-based ingredients found in the successful products will then be analyzed, which will hopefully lead to new plant-derived products with healing properties.

18 years ago

Abigail Boatwright

Abigail Boatwright is a freelance writer and photographer based in Texas, and is the editor of Horse Illustrated’s sister publication, Western Life Today.

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Samantha says:
January 23, 2007 at 8:33 am
I think it's great that this study is being done, and I hope that they are incorporating products that are available in the U.S. as well. I know what products have consistently done a good job for me: Wonder Dust, Neosporin, Alushield, Corona Ointment - I handle a number of horses and I've found that horses treated with those products heal noticeably quicker. Nevertheless, if there's a more effective product out there, I'd like to know about it.
My only question is, why are they only interested in analyzing which plant-derived ingredients? I realize that plants can be quite powerful, and that the UK has a preference for "natural" or botanical remedies, but animal-derived products, like Lanolin , and petroleum products are commonly found in wound ointments. Shouldn't the effectiveness of these things on horses be evaluated as well?