Adjunctive Debridement with Hypochlorous Acid Leads to a Healing

Problem: Complex wounds such as deep pressure ulcers, epidermolysis bullosa, sternal wounds following cardiac surgery, and wounds in immunocompromised patients require multiple modalities to advance the wound to a healing trajectory.  Surgical correction of the wound with techniques such as pedicle or free flaps is often not possible because of the overall condition of the patient.  Even surgical debridement may be contraindicated in the most severely ill patients.

Methods:  Because the eschar presenting on most of these wounds is dry, medical-grade honey has been a mainstay of our nonsurgical debridement.  Recently, we have added hypochlorous acid * irrigation and soaks to the wounds.   We have used this treatment in a series of nine patients with a total of 13 wounds.

Results:  The hypochlorous acid treatment not only served as an adjunct to debridement, but also accelerated the wounds in leading to a healing trajectory.  Once debridement was complete, continued soaks of hypochlorous acid lead to rapid complete healing of the wounds.  In the patients with the major wounds, the hypochlorous acid was also used to cleanse around tracheostomy sites and gastro-intestinal tube egress sites with successful healing of any macerated or denuded skin.  Selected examples of the nine patients will be presented in the poster.

Conclusions: Hypochlorous acid proved to be adjunctive to debridement in nine patients with 13 wounds.  The continued use following debridement lead to a healing trajectory in these complex wounds in children.

*Vashe Wound Cleanser, SteadMed Medical LLC, Fort Worth, TX