Production of hydrogel wound dressing by radiation

It has been thought that making a dry scab helps to cure a wound faster. However, recently a treatment of a wound according to moist healing theory which cure a wound without making a scab is becoming popular. Accordingly, we prepared a highly stable sheet type hydrogel in a short period by radiating electron beam to an aqueous solution of a polymer. The hydrogel is not soluble in water and keeps suitable moist environment for wound healing. Therefore, a hydrogel a wound dressing, ViewgelR in which represents a registered trademark and is referred to Viewgel hereinafter, is developed and released from July of 2004. In this paper we report the process of the development of Viewgel. (author)