Keywords
Natural Honey
Wound Microenvironment
Sustainable Wound Care
Health Equity
Frugal Innovation
Wound Bed Preparation
How to Cite
Abstract
Background. Pediatric burn injuries remain a major challenge worldwide, particularly in low-resource settings where access to specialist services and advanced wound dressings is often limited. In these contexts, successful wound management depends not only on the clinical performance of a treatment but also on its availability, affordability, continuity of supply, and compatibility with local healthcare resources.
Purpose: This Opinion explores the potential role of natural honey in pediatric burn care and discusses its relevance within a broader, sustainability-oriented approach to wound management.
Main discussion. Honey has antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, osmotic, debriding, and pro-reparative properties that may act together within the wound microenvironment. Clinical studies and pediatric case series report signals of benefit, including reduced microbial burden, granulation, autolytic debridement, and progression toward wound closure. However, the pediatric evidence remains limited by small samples, heterogeneous wound types, variable honey preparations, and a predominance of observational evidence. Rather than positioning honey as a substitute for contemporary advanced dressings, we consider its potential value as a context-responsive intervention and use it to introduce Sustainable Wound Bed Preparation, a conceptual framework that integrates wound biology with accessibility, affordability, workforce capability, supply-chain resilience, sustainability, and health equity.
Conclusions. Sustainable Wound Bed Preparation is proposed as a conceptual framework intended to stimulate discussion and future research rather than as a validated clinical model. Future investigations should evaluate not only clinical effectiveness but also implementation outcomes, environmental impact, equity, and health-system resilience to determine how sustainable wound-care strategies can improve pediatric burn management across diverse healthcare settings.
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