1505 Measuring Wounds in an Innovative and Effective Manner

Carmen Santiago, DRPH, RN, WOCN, WCC, Medica Health Management, Administrator, Southlake, TX
Measuring Wounds in an Innovative and Effective Manner

The practice of measuring wounds effectively is an important component of wound assessment. Not only does is it provide information about wound progression and non-progression but also determines effective clinical interventions. Wound measurement methods can be simple, sophisticated, two dimensional or three dimensional but often these methods and the different tools available tools used can lead to patients with wounds having different measurement in the same wound.  Preliminary results in a study conducted with ninety-three nurses of whom 43% were wound certified, revealed that although confident and competent in their ability to measure wounds they faced key challenges in the practice of measuring wounds. Specifically, in measuring depth, use of unreliable equipment and time factors. Respondents also revealed that the practice of wound measurement would be easier if more training was provided and a standardized measurement tool available. Understanding these challenges, an innovated tool was designed and developed. The purpose behind this development was to design an innovative and alternative method to measure wounds that would be practical, easier, clean, faster and reliable to use.  As designed, the tool has the capability to measure wounds and the dimensions required all within one device. When used in a cohort of thirty-five home health patients requiring wound measurements, it proved to be as effective as the most commonly and preferred method, the paper ruler, but conducted in a more reliable, simple and faster manner. This abstract will provide insights of the this new piece of equipment as an innovative and alternative method, results when used in a cohort of thirty five patients and results of a study conducted among nurses reporting barriers and challenges in measuring wounds and supporting the need for such innovative practice.