title: Review: African medicinal plants with wound healing properties.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Wounds of various types including injuries, cuts, pressure, burns, diabetic, gastric and duodenal ulcers continue to have severe socio-economic impact on the cost of health care to patients, family and health care institutions in both developing and developed countries. However, most people in the developing countries, especially Africa, depend on herbal remedies for effective treatment of wounds. Various in vitro and in vivo parameters are used for the evaluation of the functional activity of medicinal plants by using extracts, fractions and isolated compounds. The aim of the review is to identify African medicinal plants with wound healing properties within the last two decades.
  
  
  METHODS
  Electronic databases such as PubMed, Scifinder(®) and Google Scholar were used to search and filter for African medicinal plants with wound healing activity. The methods employed in the evaluation of wound healing activity of these African medicinal plants comprise both in vivo and in vitro models. In vivo wound models such as excision, incision, dead space and burn wound model are commonly employed in assessing the rate of wound closure (contraction), tensile strength or breaking strength determination, antioxidant and antimicrobial activities, hydroxyproline content assay and histological investigations including epithelialisation, collagen synthesis, and granulation tissue formation. In in vitro studies, single cell systems are mostly used to study proliferation and differentiation of dermal fibroblasts and keratinocytes by monitoring typical differentiation markers like collagen and keratin.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In this study, 61 plants belonging to 36 families with scientifically demonstrated or reported wound healing properties were reviewed. Various plant parts including leaves, fruits, stem bark and root extracts of the plants are used in the evaluation of plants for wound healing activities.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Although, a variety of medicinal plants for wound healing can be found in literature, there is a need for the isolation and characterization of the bioactive compounds responsible for the wound healing properties. Also, cytotoxicity studies should be performed on the promising agents or bioactive fractions or extracts.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana. Electronic address: cagyare.pharm@knust.edu.gh.
authors.forename: Christian
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Agyare
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana.
authors.forename: Yaw Duah
authors.initials: YD
authors.lastname: Boakye
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics and Microbiology, School of Pharmacy, College of Health Sciences, University of Ghana, Legon, Accra, Ghana.
authors.forename: Emelia Oppong
authors.initials: EO
authors.lastname: Bekoe
authors.affiliation: Institute for Pharmaceutical Biology and Phytochemistry, University of Münster, Corrensstraße 48, D-48149 Münster, Germany.
authors.forename: Andreas
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Hensel
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana.
authors.forename: Susana Oteng
authors.initials: SO
authors.lastname: Dapaah
authors.affiliation: Department of Pharmaceutics, Faculty of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology, Kumasi, Ghana.
authors.forename: Theresa
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Appiah
mesh_terms: D020834:Ethnopharmacology; D006801:Humans; D016488:Medicine, African Traditional; D010946:Plants, Medicinal / Q000145:classification*; D014945:Wound Healing / Q000187:drug effects*; D014947:Wounds and Injuries / Q000628:therapy*
keywords: African medicinal plants; Antimicrobial; Antioxidant; Wound healing activity; Wound models