Amniotic membrane is a potential regenerative option for chronic non-healing wounds: a report of five cases receiving dehydrated human amnion/chorion membrane allograft.

A case series of five patients with a total of six chronic non-healing wounds (>30 day duration) were non-randomly selected to evaluate the performance, safety and handling properties of dehydrated human amnion/chorion membrane allograft, an amniotic membrane scaffolding product. The patients had lower extremity wounds that had previously failed standard of care within a university outpatient/inpatient wound healing programme. Five wounds treated with dehydrated amnion/chorion membrane allograft showed a mean 43% area reduction from baseline (51% median) at 3 weeks into treatment and completely healed with a 64-day median time to closure (SD ±27·6 days). One wound worsened at 3 weeks and was found to have a complete central vein obstruction that was treated with long-term mild compression but still eventually healed at 6 months. Removing this outlier, the four responding wounds had a 72% mean and 69% median change in area from baseline, at the 3 week point. All five patients received only one application of dehydrated human amnion/chorion membrane allograft, and there were no adverse events. The product was easy to use, administer and handle. In summary, dehydrated human amnion/chorion membrane allograft appears to be a safe, effective and easy to use therapy for chronic non-healing wounds. This study describes the details of these clinical cases and provides an overview of the current evidence on the use of amniotic tissue in clinical practice.
(© 2015 The Authors. International Wound Journal published by Medicalhelplines.com Inc and John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)