Authors:

Sue Bale,Keith Harding

Background:

Compression hosiery was originally designed to manage venous disease for patients without ulceration, and to prevent ulceration or its recurrence. However, there is now a view that compression hosiery has a role to play in managing patients with active venous leg ulcers.

Aims:

Primary objectives were to assess the ease of application and removal, comfort on sitting and walking, and patient satisfaction with SurePress Comfort® vs usual compression system in 20 patients with venous leg ulceration (10 with chronic ulcers; 10 with new ulcers).

Methods:

A pre- and postintervention design was used to evaluate SurePress Comfort® vs usual compression system. Patients were followed for 4 weeks using their usual compression therapy, and then changed to SurePress Comfort® for a further 4 weeks. Newly ulcerated subjects then continued for a further 4 weeks.

Results:

Patients rated the comfort positively; ease of application and removal improved with time, as the patients gained experience.

Conclusions:

Despite a small study size, preliminary data suggested that there is potential to treat patients with venous leg ulceration with SurePress Comfort®.

Declaration of interest:

This study was kindly funded by an educational grant from ConvaTec.