Mechanisms of Maggot-Induced Wound Healing: What Do We Know, and Where Do We Go from Here?

Table 2

Wound Healing results associated with selected published maggot therapy studies.

	Pressure ulcer study^1		Diabetic ulcer study^2
	Conventional therapy	MDT	Conventional therapy	MDT
Quality of wound base
Initial granulation tissue as % of total area	31%	27%	18	19
Granulation tissue at 4 weeks^∗+	29%	69%	15	56
Percentage of wounds developing ≥ 50% granulation tissue	18	51
Weeks until granulation tissue reached > 50%	4.7	2.1
Change in % of granulation tissue per week*	3.30%	13%
Wound size and healing
Initial surface area in sq cm*	14	22.1	6.3	13.3
Change in surface area during treatment (sqcm)^∗+	6.3	−7.3	5	−3.8
Change in surface area per weeks^∗+	1.4	−1.5	1.15	−0.78
Percentage of wounds which decreased in size within 4 weeks*	44%	79%
Healing rate at 4 weeks^∗+	−0.038	0.101	−0.08	0.08
Healing rate at 8 weeks^∗+	−0.027	0.096	−0.02	0.07
Percentage of wounds completely healed	21%	39%	21	36
Average time to complete healing (weeks)	13.4	12	18	15

1Sherman, 2002 [18] (*identifies significantly different results between the two arms of this study); 2Sherman, 2003 [19] (⁺identifies significantly different results between the two arms of this study). The wound healing rate, based on studies by Gilman [69] and Margolis et al. [70], was defined as the change in surface area divided by the mean circumference over time. Study details provided in text.