Original title: The Role of Macrophages in Acute and Chronic Wound Healing and Interventions to Promote Pro-wound Healing Phenotypes
Macrophages are immune cells that help wounds heal through inflammation, tissue growth, and remodeling. In a healing wound, the local macrophageAn immune cell that helps respond to injury and supports the body's repair process. population tends to shift from pro-inflammatory M1-like states toward anti-inflammatory M2-like states. Chronic wounds can remain in the inflammation stage, leaving macrophages with pro-inflammatory traits. This review describes possible ways to change that, including adding M2-like cells or using treatments that may promote them. It also explains why researchers still disagree about how to label these states and which one best supports healing.
Imagine cleaning a muddy room after a spill. Scrubbing is useful at first, but if you keep scrubbing and never start drying and repairing the floor, the room stays stuck in cleanup. In this paper, the early cleanup matches inflammation, while the later repair stages depend on the wound moving beyond it; chronic wounds can remain in cleanup, and the review examines ways to change the cells involved.
People with pressure, arterial, venous, or diabetic ulcers may face wounds that do not move on to later stages of healing. This review examines ways researchers try to shift local macrophages toward states that may support repair, while noting that the best state for healing is still unclear.
The review identifies ongoing challenges rather than establishing a single best treatment or macrophage state. It notes that phenotype labels are not standardized, the distinct roles of phenotypes remain unclear, and the optimal phenotype for chronic wound healing is not known.
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The Role of Macrophages in Acute and Chronic Wound Healing and Interventions to Promote Pro-wound Healing Phenotypes — Paulina Krzyszczyk, Rene S. Schloss, Andre Francis Palmer et al. — Frontiers in Physiology — doi:10.3389/fphys.2018.00419
Abstract licence: CC BY
Explanation generated by Synthesis from the abstract — it is not the original paper.