In Vitro Evaluation of Polihexanide, Octenidine and NaClO/HClO-Based Antiseptics against Biofilm Formed by Wound Pathogens.

Grzegorz Krasowski,Elżbieta Makomaska-Szaroszyk,Karol Fijałkowski,Grzegorz Chodaczek,Justyna Paleczny,Joanna Czajkowska,Beata Kowalska-Krochmal,Paweł Migdał,Adam Junka,Michał Majkowski,Marzenna Bartoszewicz

doi:10.3390/membranes11010062

Abstract

Chronic wounds complicated with biofilm formed by pathogens remain one of the most significant challenges of contemporary medicine. The application of topical antiseptic solutions against wound biofilm has been gaining increasing interest among clinical practitioners and scientific researchers. This paper compares the activity of polyhexanide-, octenidine- and hypochlorite/hypochlorous acid-based antiseptics against biofilm formed by clinical strains of Candida albicans, Staphylococcus aureus and Pseudomonas aeruginosa. The analyses included both standard techniques utilizing polystyrene plates and self-designed biocellulose-based models in which a biofilm formed by pathogens was formed on an elastic, fibrinous surface covered with a fibroblast layer. The obtained results show high antibiofilm activity of polihexanide- and octenidine-based antiseptics and lack or weak antibiofilm activity of hypochlorite-based antiseptic of total chlorine content equal to 80 parts per million. The data presented in this paper indicate that polihexanide- or octenidine-based antiseptics are highly useful in the treatment of biofilm, while hypochlorite-based antiseptics with low chlorine content may be applied for wound rinsing but not when specific antibiofilm activity is required.

Highlights

In the first stage of the experiment, we have conducted a precondition analysis of the activity of the investigated antiseptic products towards planktonic cells of C. albicans, S. aureus and P. aeruginosa using a standard MBC evaluation performed in 96-well plates
The highest concentration of active substance which can be applied in the MBC methodology is 25% of the antiseptic’s stock solution
The results indicate that none of tested antiseptics were fully effective within 1 min of contact time against the tested pathogens; none of the antiseptics applied were effective against all Candida albicans biofilms within 15 min of contact time

Summary

Introduction

Reports indicate that biofilm-forming microorganisms may be a few hundred times more resistant to antibiotics than their free-floating (referred to as planktonic) counterparts [9]. Because of their size, persistence and the patients’ comorbidities, chronic wounds are at particular risk of developing BRIs. The report by Bjarnsholt et al [10] showed the presence of biofilm in 78.2% of chronic wounds with a disturbed healing pattern. Because locally-delivered antibiotics are considered ineffective or inadvisable in fighting wound biofilm, other countermeasures are presently used in clinical routine They are mainly: surgical debridement, maggot therapy, antimicrobial dressings and the application of antiseptics [11]

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