Wound management in patients with chronic wounds in ambulatory nursing--a pilot study

Abstract

Currently relevant data about prevalence of chronic wounds and wound management in home care nursing services are not available for Germany. In this study 38 home care nursing services were surveyed by means of a questionnaire. Response rate was 61%. Results showed that almost 9% of the home care nursing services treated patients suffering from chronic wounds. The most common wound was the pressure ulcer with a prevalence of 4.1%, followed by leg ulcer (2.7%) and the diabetic foot (1%). The questionnaire about wound management was completed for 47 patients of 24 home care services. 29 of the patients were females and 18 males. The average age of the patients was 78 years. Important diagnostic information about the nature and the recurrence rate of the wounds was not available to the nursing staff. The average time that a wound existed was 6.7 years with a range of 3 weeks to 45 years. 87% of the patients had their wound dressings on a daily basis. The average time needed for wound dressing was 17 minutes. Wound management often occurred in a idiosyncratic way and did not always follow evidence based practice. Wound management can be significantly improved by the use of modern wound dressing, reduction of the frequency of wound dressings, standardized wound documentation and better co-operation with doctors, nursing experts and health insurance organisations. Basis on the convenience nature of the sample results of this survey should be generalized and interpreted with caution. This study gives clear indications of the significance of the problem. More studies with representative samples are needed.