Chronic Wound Healing

Often times the management of chronic wounds can become challenging for clinicians. In the article by Sibbald et al (1) they emphasize that wound healing should be achieved through an interprofessional team approach where the focus is holistic, focusing not only on the patient’s wound but on the patient as a whole. Once the cause of the wound is identified, the wound can be classified into three categories: healable, maintenance and non healable (1). Referring to the wound bed preparation paradigm discussed in Sibbald et al (2) I will discuss a management approach for each wound category.
Healable Wounds
Effective management of healable wounds requires sufficient vascular supply to the wound site, the underlying cause corrected, and the health of the patient optimized. Understanding the history of a wound and its current wound bed status (i.e wound size, depth, tissue, edges), is significant when determining its severity as well as identifying the factors that may be contributing to the delayed
When dealing with populations whose health is already compromised, such as the indigenous population in Northern Manitoba, the circumstances surrounding wound healing becomes complicated. As a primary care nurse working in this region, it is challenging working with patients to optimize their health conditions and to reduce barriers that delay wound healing. In addition to many chronic illnesses, our population struggle with many barriers that affect wound healing including addictions, financial challenges, transportation restrictions and poor nutrition to name a few. These factors and many others have attributed to wound healing delays and complications. While resources are available to assist patients to reduce and overcome these barriers, the patient must take responsibility for their health as well and work in collaboration with the