Prostacyclin Pathway to Enhance Wound Healing in Diabetic Foot Ulcers
April 2023
in “
Journal of Investigative Dermatology
”
Studysummary This study found that treprostinil, a prostacyclin analog, significantly delayed fibroblast migration from healthy donors but did not affect fibroblast migration derived from diabetic foot ulcers. Our plain-language summary of this paper — not a Tressless recommendation.
The study investigated the healing potential of the prostacyclin or pgi2 signaling pathway in diabetic foot ulcers (DFUs). The researchers assessed the effect of treprostinil, a pgi2 analog, on cell migration, angiogenesis, and remodeling phases using 2D cell culture-based and 3D prevascularized wounded DFU skin-like models. The results showed that treprostinil significantly delayed fibroblast migration derived from healthy donors in a concentration-dependent manner. However, on DFU-derived cells, treprostinil didn't have any significant effect on fibroblast migration. This study is the first to explore the pgi2 migratory impact on DFU-derived fibroblasts, which could help understand why diabetic fibroblasts are irresponsive to Pgi2. Further research on treprostinil's migratory and angiogenic effects on DFU-derived keratinocytes and dermal microvascular endothelial cells is promising for a complete understanding of the pgi2 role in restoring the impaired healing activity in DFUs.
