Wound coatings can severely delay chronic wound healing by inducing ischaemia and degradation of viable tissue and increasing susceptibility to infection. It is, therefore, essential to cleanse wounds gently and thoroughly to remove the detrimental coatings. In this study, an in-vitro model that mimics wound coatings (human plasma dried onto adhesive glass slides) was used to compare the efficacy of four sterile solutions used to cleanse wounds: saline and Ringer's (both salt solutions), a betaine surfactant-containing wound rinsing solution (Prontosan B. Braun) and an antiseptic solution (Octenisept Schülke & Mayr). Both salt solutions and the wound rinsing solution were found to remove protein from the test wound coatings, whereas the test coatings became fixed and insoluble when immersed in antiseptic solution.