History

If wound healing disorders are detected early and receive appropriate therapy promptly, they are no further cause for great concern. However, especially in the case of very large wounds, such as those resulting from surgical procedures, inadequate or unsuccessful therapy can lead to massive inflammation and thus to life-threatening conditions. For this reason, people with a predisposition to wound healing disorders (e.g. elderly people with diabetes) should always carefully consider whether surgery is actually necessary and, if so, closely monitor the patient and his or her wound afterwards.

Phases of wound healing

Wound healing can generally be divided into three phases, whereby these do not have to follow each other strictly, but can rather blur into each other or even run partly parallel to each other.

The first phase is the so-called cleansing phase (also known as the exudative phase), which lasts from the immediate injury until about the third day of wound healing. In this phase, hemostasis and blood coagulation first take place, which then changes into increased secretion of blood plasma into the intermediate cell tissue through subsequent vascular dilatation and increased vascular permeability.
This facilitates the migration of defence cells into the wound area, so that they can subsequently break down broken cell material and create an antibacterial environment.
The second phase is the granulation phase, which begins on the 4th day and lasts until approximately the 5th day of June. In this phase, new cells and vessels are formed, so that the primary wound defect is covered by a first so-called granulation tissue.
The last phase is the differentiation phase, which mainly takes place between the 6th and 10th day of wound healing. The granulation tissue increasingly matures and slowly turns into scar tissue with less water and fewer vessels, collagen fibres are incorporated, the wound contracts and new epithelial cells migrate. Whether a wound is remodeled in scar tissue or completely regenerated depends largely on the depth of the wound.