The burden of dehisced wounds in the community: using early results from a multi-centre service evaluation to propose a standard of care to improve patient outcomes and safeguard woundcare budgets

Abstract

Non-healing wounds and their associated costs present a significant challenge to wound care services. Dehisced wounds are often overlooked, with a lack of true understanding regarding the additional burden this represents. As a consequence, there is a lack of evidence around what is deemed gold standard care, with no published pathways to support clinical practice. A 34-patient data set was captured and analysed as part of an evaluation of hard-to-heal wounds. Patients with wounds meeting specific criteria followed a hard-to-heal wound pathway that facilitated single use negative pressure wound therapy. Implementation of this pathway helped to achieve healing for 18 out of 34 (52.9%) wounds over a 12-week period, subsequently reducing the overall wound care spend from £76 828 to £60 251 for this group. A notably improved response was seen in patients who had a chronic wound of less than 6 months in duration, indicating the importance of earlier intervention and the positive impact this can have on the patient experience and associated health economic outcomes. This service evaluation supports the use of single use negative pressure wound therapy for non-progressing dehisced surgical wounds as part of an indication-led pathway.