A feasibility study on chronic wounds of laser Doppler perfusion imaging during Topical Negative Pressure therapy

Abstract

Topical Negative Pressure (TNP) therapy is a new non-invasive, active and moist wound treatment, where increased healing of the chronic wound is caused by a subatmospheric (‘negative’) pressure. The amount of suction used during TNP therapy is mainly based on an experimental animal study by Morykwas et al. in 1997, and does not depend on wound parameters. Wounds are often treated according to the same protocol at the same negative pressure. Hence the therapy is not really patient and wound specific. For optimizing TNP therapy, it is preferable that the amount of suction is somehow determined by a relevant wound parameter. Perfusion is one such wound parameter which could be used for this purpose. We have studied if the perfusion of chronic wounds (n=8) changes during different circumstances and if this perfusion change is measurable with laser Doppler perfusion imaging (LDPI). The results suggest that LDPI can be used during TNP therapy to investigate the process of wound healing, because there are measurable blood flow changes during suction.