The effect of nutritional anemia on the tensile strength of healing soft tissue and bone wounds in the rat

Abstract

Many aspects of wound healing have been stndied experimentally in both animals and humans in considerable detail, but the influence of nutritional anemia on wound healing has had little mention in the medical or dental literature. It has been the clinical impression of some surgeons that wounds in anemic patients heal poorly. The few controlled studies which are found in the literature, however, appear to be inconclusive as far as determining whether a nutritional anemia does have an adverse effect on wound healing in experimental animals. It was felt, therefore, that the problem of nutritional anemia and its relationship to experimental wound healing should be further investigated.