Amputation of foot in severe cases… A new treatment for diabetic foot ulcer?

It is noteworthy that a new treatment is being tried for the management of patients with diabetic foot ulcers (diabetic foot), a typical complication of diabetes.

Clinical evaluation of ‘esmolol’, a beta-blocker drug, is a drug in a gel formulation that is simply applied to the wound caused by an ulcer.

Esmolol is a short-acting beta-adrenergic receptor blocker that has already obtained approval for various heart diseases such as ventricular tachycardia and is expected to undergo additional treatment efficacy evaluation.

According to the medical community, the clinical results of evaluating the improvement effect and safety of esmolol in the treatment of diabetic foot ulcers were published in the latest issue of the international journal ‘JAMA Network Open’. The results were presented at the annual meeting of the European Diabetes Association (EASD) last year.

Diabetic foot ulcer is a representative complication of diabetes, which is a disease in which ulcers occur in the foot due to hypoglycemic control, neurological complications, and peripheral vascular disease. Usually, 15 to 25% of diabetic patients experience foot ulcers, and some of them have part of the foot amputated due to continuous necrosis of skin tissue.

Current treatments include a dressing method that covers the wound and keeps it moist, and debridement that surgically removes necrotic tissue. However, there is no clear cure for diabetic foot ulcers.

In this clinical trial, 176 patients with type 1 or type 2 diabetes (aged 18 to 75 years old) recruited from 27 tertiary medical institutions across India were enrolled. The average age of clinical participants was 56.4 years, 69.3% were male, the average glycated hemoglobin (A1c) level, which evaluates the degree of worsening of diabetes, was 8.6%, and the average ulcer area was 4.7 cm2.

It compared the wound closure effect of ulcers after 12 weeks of using the treatment targeting them. As a result of the evaluation, it was found that the wound closure effect was more than twice as high in the patient group who used esmolol gel along with standard treatment compared to conventional treatment.

60.3% of patients treated with esmolol gel and standard treatment achieved the target wound closure, whereas only 41.7% in the standard treatment alone treatment group.

Moreover, wound closure results were significantly improved in patients who used esmolol gel twice daily. The benefit of this treatment was also noticeable in high-risk patients with delayed wound healing.

“Esmolol is expected to play an important role in the treatment of diabetic foot ulcers,” said a research team at Chandigarh Medical School in India. /m2 or more, or in patients weighing more than 80 kg,” he explained.

Esmolol, which has a gel-type formulation, has a mechanism of action that enhances the healing effect of ulcers by moving keratinocytes, fibroblasts, and endothelial cells of the skin to scar tissue. The research was led by NovaLead, a bio company that is developing a new drug for ‘esmolol hydrochloride (Galnobax, product name: Galnobax)’ in a gel formulation.