Epidermal growth factor increases tensile strength during wound healing.

Twenty pigmented rabbits weighing 2-3 kg were employed. Under operating microscope control, a Graefe knife was used to perform a 6-mm-long perforating incision in the central cornea. The operated eye which showed a stimulation unit at 4 ng X ml-1 on rat 3T3 cells in 10 rabbits was treated locally with sterile PBS, and on day 30 the rabbits were sacrificed and the operated eye enucleated. The central cornea was excised using a cutting template 10 X 3 mm, with the long axis perpendicular to the center of the experimental wound. The tensile strength was determined by measuring the force of rupture of the wounds using a dynamometer. The results indicate that epidermal growth factor significantly (p less than 0.001) increased corneal wound tensile strength after the first month of healing.