The secret to better equine wound healing might have been with us all along, thanks to bees.

"When field practitioners applied MGH to horses’ wounds prior to suturing, the defects were more likely to have complete wound healing within two weeks, before suture removal, than horses that didn’t receive MGH, said Gal Kelmer, DVM, MS, Dipl. ACVS, ECVS, of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Koret School of Veterinary Medicine, in Beit Dagan, Israel.

Further, he said, these horses had fewer signs of infection, and their veterinarians were generally more satisfied with the wound healing process than those whose patients hadn’t received the honey.

Kelmer, who uses MGH in clinical settings regularly, said he wasn’t surprised by the results. “I use MGH inside repaired lacerations and inside elective surgeries, just prior to skin closure, in most of the surgeries I’ve performed in the past couple of years,” he said. “I’m extremely satisfied with the outcome.”