Honey for Burns, Cuts, and Healing Faster

Scientific studies from around the world are reporting the usefulness of simple honey for burns and cuts and healing faster, even cuts, burns, and pressure sores of life-threatening severity. And if you are looking for an answer to the question "What's the best way of healing scabs?" honey may be your answer.

Any cream or lotion applied to broken skin has several tasks to perform to support the repair process in wound healing. It has to provide protection over the wound. It has to prevent infection. And it has to support the process of granulation, the reforming of new skin. There are at least 168 studies in the medical literature documenting the use of honey to treat cuts, burns, and various kinds of skin lesions performing all these functions. Here are summaries of just a few:

A medical research team at the University of Bonn applied medical honey to burns infected with MRSA (methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) that had not responded to antibiotics or antiseptics. The researchers note "full healing" was achieved in seven consecutive cases. In these cases, honey stopped infection and was the best way of healing scabs.

The Woodfield Retirement Village in Haberfield, New South Wales, Australia, had a resident who had chronic venous ulcers on his leg. A cream combining honey with alginates extracted from kelp deodorized the wounds, which later healed.

The Woodfield Retirement Village has also experimented with honey as a way of treating bedsores on the ankle and on the small of the back. They do not report that the bedsores went away, but that honey deodorized and reduced inflammation.

The Ege School of Nursing in Izmir, Turkey found that applying a honey dressing to bedsores and other pressure wounds accelerated healing to a rate approximately four times faster than bedsores treated with a standard anti-bacterial cream.

Dr. Luis Vitetta of the National Institute of Integrative Medicine in Australia notes that patients with serious burns (up to 40 per cent of the body surface) need 2-3 fewer different kinds of systemic antibiotics to stay infection free when their wounds are treated with honey.

How does honey do this?

Scientists believe there is something about the balance of sugars in honey that causes the genes in skin cells that regulate collagen production to become more active. There are also some antibacterial compounds in honey that, in nature, preserve it for the use of the bees that make it.

Is one kind of honey better than another?

Some natural health commentators believe that honey made by bees living in extreme climates (the prairie provinces of Canada, the Brazilian rain forest, the Mohave desert, for example) has greater antioxidant potency, and they're probably right. Whether this translates into greater skin healing power is not scientifically established.

Is honey safe to put on skin?

Bacterial contamination of honey is extremely rare, and there have been no recalls of honey because of biological contamination in the USA. In just one incidence, honey contaminated with the pesticide Lindane was seized by inspectors, but this honey was stored in close proximity to a plant that made the pesticide.

How do you put honey on the skin?

In an emergency situation, simply wash the wound in cool (not cold or ice) water, soak the first layer of cloth you will use to dress the wound in honey, and then apply the honey-soaked dressing to the wound, with another layer to keep the honey dressing clean and in place. Change daily or as doctor orders.

Self-care is only recommended for first-degree burns (reddened skin that blanches white when touched) or for more serious burns only when medical attention is unavailable. Always consult a physician, if possible, when burns have broken the skin. Similarly, consult a physician, if possible, when cuts have torn tissues below the skin.

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