Treatment of World Health Organisation “Priority Pathogens” Relevant to Wound Care by an Activated Carbon Cloth Dressing

Background: In 2017 the World Health Organization (WHO) published a list of “priority pathogens” highlighting 12 families of bacteria that pose the greatest threat to human health. This list included several wound pathogens which are resistant to multiple antibiotics and responsible for many chronic wound infections. The presence of bacteria in a wound bed prevents healing and can lead to chronic infections with lengthy recovery times and increased treatment costs. 

Methods: A direct contact method was used to assess the efficacy of an Activated Carbon Cloth (ACC), a microbial binding dressing, against two antibiotic resistant bacteria found on the WHO “priority pathogens” list and commonly found in wound infections. ACC and a negative control dressing were cut into 2 cm x 2 cm samples and inoculated with 100 µL of Acinetobacter baumannii or Enterococcus faecium (VRE) bacterial inoculum. Test dressings were incubated at 37°C ± 2°C for 30 minutes or 24 hours. Following incubation, remaining viable organisms were recovered and quantified.

Results: Following 30 minutes incubation, there was no reduction in the quantity of viable organisms recovered from ACC compared to the negative control, as expected. Following 24 hours treatment with ACC, a significant reduction in viable A. baumannii and E. faecium was observed, compared to the negative control. This was equivalent to a log reduction of 3.25 ± 0.29 Log10CFUmL-1 and 2.95 ± 0.17 Log10CFUmL 1 respectively. 

Conclusion: The presence of bacteria, particularly those named on the WHO “priority pathogens” list, in a wound can prevent a wound from transitioning from a non-healing to a healing state. This data suggests that ACC reduced growth of two wound pathogens identified on the WHO list of “priority pathogens”, therefore demonstrating the potential to aid wound healing.