Collagen is essential as a physiological material in wound healing, so it is often used in wound management, mainly as a lyophilisate. Collagen also has excellent film-forming properties; unfortunately, however, its utilisation as a film wound dressing is limited because of its weak mechanical properties, especially in its wet state. For this reason, modifications or combinations with different materials are investigated. The combination of collagen with partially modified microfibrillar carboxymethylcellulose (CMC), which has not previously been described, provided a new possibility for strengthening collagen films and was the aim of this work. The collagen-CMC films based on three types of collagens, two plasticizers and two collagen. Plasticiser ratios were prepared using the solvent casting method; partially modified CMC served here as both a film-forming agent and a filler, without compromising the transparency of the films. The presence of microfibrils was confirmed microscopically by SEM. Organoleptic and physicochemical evaluation, especially in terms of practical application on wounds, demonstrated that all the samples had satisfactory properties for this purpose even after wetting. All the films retained acidic pH values even after 24 h, with a maximum of 6.27 ± 0.17, and showed a mild degree of swelling, with a maximum of about 6 after 24 h.
Keywords: blend films; collagen; film wound dressing; microfibrillated carboxymethylcellulose; solvent casting method; wound healing.