Spatial-temporal changes of mechanical microenvironment in skin wounds during negative pressure wound therapy

Cell migration, proliferation and differentiation are regulated by mechanical cues during skin wound healing. Negative pressure wound therapy (NPWT) reduces the healing period by optimizing the mechanical microenvironment of wound bed. Under NPWT, it remains elusive how the mechanical microenvironment (e.g., stiffness, strain gradients) changes both in time and space during wound healing. To illustrate this, the healing time of full-thickness skin wounds under NPWT, with pressure settings ranging from -50 to -150 mmHg were evaluated and compared with gauze dressing treatments (control group), and three-dimensional finite element models of full-thickness skin wounds on days 1 and 5 after treatment were developed based on MR 3D imaging data. Shear wave elastography (SWE) was applied to detect the stiffness of wound soft tissue on days 1 and 5, and nonlinear finite element analysis (FEA) was used to represent the spatial-temporal of 3D strain field of the wound under NPWT vs the control group. Compared with ...