Journal Articles

An initiative to improve the effectiveness of wound healing within GP Practices

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An initiative to improve the effectiveness of wound healing within GP Practices

Janette Ryzy, Michael Clark, Sian Cryer, Trudie Young
12 March 2019

Background: The greatest burden of community based wound care falls on nurses working within GP Practices. Despite the common treatment of wounds by Practice Nurses little formal guidance is available to this cohort and significant gaps in practice have been reported. Local problem: Objective was to improve wound management and so help reduce the number of patients with wounds seen by the GP Practices. Methods: Interventions: Two complex wound clinics established in GP Practices in South Wales with one-to-one support provided to Practice Nurses by an experienced wound clinician. Results: Within one of the GP Practices data was collected pre- and postimplementation of the wound clinic with healing increased from 33.3% to 67.3% postimplementation. The mix of wounds treated was similar pre- and post-implementation of the complex wound clinic with venous leg ulcers, surgical wounds, traumatic wounds and leg wounds being the common frequently reported aetiologies. The cost of wound treatment was similar pre- and post-implementation of the complex wound clinic. Conclusions: This quality improvement project identified that wound care delivered within GP Practices may result in low healing rates which can be markedly improved through development and introduction of a wound clinic. The approach was successful within the two wound clinics established within the project with healing rates around 70% in both clinics, while the cost of wound treatment did not appear to be markedly changes before or after wound clinic introduction. Expansion of this model may enable GP Practices to successfully treat the wounds of the many thousands of patients who present with wounds in their GP Practice each year.  

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