Can sprinkling sugar into a wound speed up the healing process? The papers are today reporting on some new research we touched on back in August.

When Moses Murandu was a child in Zimbabwe and gashed his leg his father sprinkled sugar into the wound when dressing it.

Well now Moses is a senior nurse and lecturer at the University of Wolverhampton and he's been conducting clinical trials to see the impact sugar has when used as a dressing on infected wounds.

He funded the initial study at Selly Oak on a few patients himself. Treating problems like open infected wounds and bedsores. And the results were so promising he's now been awarded £25,000 to expand the trial with up to 300 patients in different hospitals across the Midlands.

His initial paper has also just been accepted for publication in the November issue of Wounds International. While this early study was limited to just 21 patients, the conclusions are extremely positive.

We had not anticipated the immediate and dramatic abolition of wound odour which enabled us to move patients from isolation to the open ward within 24 hours of commencing treatment, nor the marked reduction in analgesic requirements, particularly in venous ulcer patients who had previously refused bed rest in elevation on the grounds that this was intolerably painful.

Sugar is often much cheaper than other more sophisticated dressings and treatments. Though you do need a sterile source.

UPDATE Having spent a very interesting morning with Moses, I think it might be worth stressing just how hard he's worked to get this project off the ground. We simply didn't have time to go into this in the report.

It took some six months to convince the relevant authorities to drop the £25,000 new drug registration fee for this trial. Then Moses had to approach a number of different hospitals to find consultants and nurses who were happy for the trial to go ahead on their ward. Finally the trial itself has involved a lot of work for Moses. He had to get up at six to check on his patients, then go off to the day job as a lecturer and then return to check on his patients again in the evening.

But he told me what makes it all worthwhile is seeing his patients happy and comfortable after weeks of dealing with pain from wounds that just won't heal.

If you have an old family remedy like this then do get in touch.