Effect of 'Compound R' on thermal burn and full-depth wound contracture in fuzzy rats.

We evaluated the efficacy of Compound R emulsion on wound contraction in fuzzy rats. While the rats were under anesthesia, two mirror-image burn wounds were inflicted on the depilated back skin of each. Wounds were assigned randomly to treatment or placebo (oil), and the wound-scar areas were measured when they healed. A second set of wounds was created by taking two 6 millimeter punch biopsies from each rat and treated with Compound R or placebo. Under anesthesia, areas of the wound were measured on days 0, 5, 8 and on healing. Mean+/-SE areas for the healed burn wounds were: 151+/-24 mm2 for the treated and 102+/-26 mm2 for the placebo side (paired Student's t test, t=4.21, p=0.0015). Areas for Compound R-treated punch biopsy-induced wounds were significantly larger than placebo treated at each time point (p < 0.01). Results from this study show that Compound R impeded wound contraction.