Guidelines for pressure ulcer prevention to be introduced at conference
New international guidelines for performing prevalence and incidence studies on pressure ulcers will make their debut today and Saturday at the Biennial Conference of the National Pressure Ulcer Advisory Panel.The guidelines lay down standardized approaches to pressure ulcer identification, classification, evaluation, interpretation and comparison, and other factors in pressure ulcer study, treatment and prevention. Comprehensive international guidelines are necessary because current variations in the type of data collected and methods used during collection make valid study comparisons difficult, according to the report. Kinetic Concepts Inc. provided an educational grant for the report, "International Guidelines - Pressure Ulcer Prevention: Prevalence and Incidence in Context."
Pressure ulcers are a major concern for nursing homes. They are one of 10 quality indicators considered by the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services on its Nursing Home Compare Web site. The report can be found online at www.kci1.com.
