In a small clinical trial, adding thymalin (a short peptide) to a complex treatment for diabetic foot ulcers helped wounds clear debris faster and heal about a week sooner than standard care. The peptide was applied by electrophoresis together with other therapies like laser and antioxidants.

To improve a complex surgical treatment of patients with the diabetic foot (DF), 46 patients with examined and treated this condition were. According to the treatments used, the patients were divided into 2 groups: study and control ones. The study group (n = 28) received current complex treatment using laser and immune therapies. The control group had routine therapy. In addition to hypoglycemic, disintoxication, and antibacterial therapy, a complex of drugs, which included antioxidants, thioctic acid preparations, agents that improved regional blood flow and microcirculation (sulodexide, pentoxyfilline), and immunomodulators was used to treat patients of the study group. In this group, physiotherapeutic techniques, such as electrophoresis with trental, ascorbic acid, and thymaline and intravenous laser radiation, were applied. Laser units were employed. Pathological tissues were dissected and evaporated with a focused and partially defocussed laser ray. Then local laser therapy was performed; after active granulation tissue appeared, plastic repair of a wound with local tissues was applied. Cytological studies of touch smears indicated that in patients with diabetes mellitus who had received the complex therapy, pyonecrotic wounds and trophic ulcers were cleansed of wound detritus and fibrin within shorter periods (12.6 +/- 2.1 days) than those in the patients of the control group (16.3 +/- 2.6 days). The time of wound healing was 27.3 +/- 2.8 days and 35.4 +/- 3.9 days), which also favors the new treatments of this pathology.