The clinical and cost effectiveness of remote expert wound nurse consultation for healing of pressure injuries among residential aged care patients: A protocol for a prospective pilot parallel cluster randomised controlled trial

Suzanne Kapp*, Marie Gerdtz, Charne Miller, Amit Gefen, William Padula, Lauren Wilson, Michael Woodward, Nick Santamaria

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

Pressure injuries affect 1 to 46% of residents in aged care (long term) facilities and cause a substantial economic burden on health care systems. Remote expert wound nurse consultation has the potential to improve pressure injury outcomes; however, the clinical and cost effectiveness of this intervention for healing of pressure injuries in residential aged care require further investigation. We describe the remote expert wound nurse consultation intervention and the method of a prospective, pilot, cluster randomised controlled trial. The primary outcome is number of wounds healed. Secondary outcomes are wound healing rate, time to healing, wound infection, satisfaction, quality of life, cost of treatment and care, hospitalisations, and deaths. Intervention group participants receive the intervention over a 12-week period and all participants are monitored for 24 weeks. A wound imaging and measurement system is used to analyse pressure injury images. A feasibility and fidelity evaluation will be concurrently conducted. The results of the trial will inform the merit of and justification for a future definitive trial to evaluate the clinical and cost effectiveness of remote expert wound nurse consultation for the healing of pressure injuries in residential aged care.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)2953-2963
Number of pages11
JournalInternational Wound Journal
Volume20
Issue number8
DOIs
StatePublished - Oct 2023

Funding

FundersFunder number
Melbourne Academic Centre for Health
Mölnlycke Health Care
Victorian Medical Research Acceleration Fund
University of Melbourne

    Keywords

    • aged care
    • implementation research
    • pilot randomised controlled trial
    • pressure ulcer
    • protocol

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