2011 Volume 15 Issue 3 Pages 231-238
Management of wound fluid is an important component in pressure ulcer treatment. In order to select appropriate dressings, it is necessary to evaluate wound fluid volume accurately; however, traditional methods based on the frequency of gauze change or its weight are semi-quantitative with limited precision. The purposes of this study were to reveal the distribution of wound fluid volume of full-thickness pressure ulcers and to develop a quantitative algorithm to estimate wound fluid volume using wound characteristics. A cross-sectional study was conducted for older patients with full-thickness pressure ulcers. Thirty-six patients with 44 pressure ulcers were included in the analyses. Wound fluid was collected in a polyurethane film dressing and its volume was measured as a reference. The median volume（range）of wound fluid of pressure ulcers was 4.2（0.1-47.0）ml/day. Using a general linear model, the traditional method using gauze-change frequency did not show adequate accuracy（R2=0.44）. The most accurate model provided five classes combined with the frequency of gauze change, DESIGN-R total score classified by 22 points, and the healing process（R2=0.67）. The least squares mean（95% confidence interval）of estimated wound fluid volume（ml/day）was 0.2（0.1-0.4）for class I; 1.2（0.6-2.2）for class II; 4.7（2.2-10.0）for class III; 7.3（3.4-15.7）for class IV; and 27.3（9.8-76.0）for class V. The developed algorithm to estimate wound fluid volume quantitatively will contribute to standardize the selection of suitable management options for full-thickness pressure ulcers.
