WOUND HEALING ACTIVITY OF TOPICAL LAWSONE GEL ON RAT MODEL

The objective of present work is to study the wound healing effect of topical lawsone gel. Topical lawsone gel was prepared by using natural and synthetic polymers in different ratios. The gel was prepared with Tara gum and HPMC K15M using dispersion method. Optimized gels were characterized for physicochemical evaluations. Optimised formulations (LT3, LT4) were evaluated for spreadability (10.6±0.02, 13.8±0.28), pH (6±0.58, 5±0.59), viscosity (18000±62.5, 18023±71.3) and drug content (94.51±0.63, 87.08±0.40). The gel was found to be homogeneous and uniform without any formation of lumps. In vitro release of optimized gel (LT3, LT4) showed control release of 81.68% and 87.47% within 7 hours. The formulation was found to follow zero order model dependent kinetics with fickian diffusion possessing a release rate of 198.3 and 202.4 µg /cm²/hr^-1/2. Animal studies performed with optimized formulations (LT3, LT4) showed wound contraction of (85.30±1.56%, 99.21±1.32%) when compared to the control gel (76.61±2.15%). The period of epithelisation of LT3, LT4 formulation showed complete epithelisation on 13.4±0.45 and 14.2±0.61 days respectively, when compared to control gel (21.6±0.50) days. The results of LT3&LT4 formulations showed better wound healing activity and can be used for the treatment of excision wounds. In the excision wound model, results showed that the wound contracting capacity of lawsone was significantly greater than (P<0.05) the control.