years by the sterile insect technique. History Frederick William Hope coined the term myiasis in 1840 to refer to diseases resulting from dipterous larvae as opposed to those caused by other insect larvae (the term for this was scholechiasis). Hope described several cases of myiasis from Jamaica caused by unknown larvae, one of which resulted in death. Even though the term myiasis was first used in 1840, such conditions have been known since ancient times. Ambroise Paré, the chief surgeon to King Charles IX and King Henry III, observed that maggots often infested open wounds. Maggot therapy Throughout recorded history, maggots have been used therapeutically to clean out necrotic wounds, an application known as maggot therapy''. Fly larvae that feed on dead tissue can clean wounds and may reduce bacterial activity and the chance of a secondary infection. They dissolve dead tissue by secreting digestive enzymes onto the wound as well as actively eating the dead tissue with mouth hooks, two hard, probing appendages protruding on either side of the "mouth". Maggot therapyalso known as maggot debridement therapy (MDT), larval therapy, larva therapy, or larvae therapyis the intentional introduction by a health care practitioner of live, disinfected green bottle fly maggots into the non-healing skin and soft tissue wounds of a human or other animal for the purpose of selectively cleaning out only the necrotic tissue within a wound in order to promote healing. Although maggot therapy has been used in the US for the past 80 years, it was approved by the FDA as a medical device only in 2004 (along with leeches). Maggots were the first live organism to be marketed in the US according to FDA regulations, and are approved for treating neuropathic (diabetic) foot ulcers, pressure ulcers, venous stasis ulcers, and traumatic and post-surgical wounds that are unresponsive to conventional therapies. Maggots were used in medicine before this time, but were not federally regulated. In 1990, California internist Ronald Sherman began treating patients with maggots produced at his lab at the UC Irvine School of Medicine. Sherman went on to co-found Monarch Labs in 2005, which UC Irvine contracted to produce maggots for Sherman's own continuing clinical research on myiasis at the university. Monarch Labs also sells maggots to hospitals and other medical practices, the first US commercial supplier to do so since the last one closed in 1935. In the US, demand for these fly