title: Treatment of early-stage pressure ulcers by using autologous adipose tissue grafts.
abstract: Assessing pressure ulcers (PUs) in early stages allows patients to receive safer treatment. Up to now, in addition to clinical evaluation, ultrasonography seems to be the most suitable technique to achieve this goal. Several treatments are applied to prevent ulcer progression but none of them is totally effective. Furthermore, the in-depth knowledge of fat regenerative properties has led to a wide use of it. With this study the authors aim at introducing a new approach to cure and prevent the worsening of early-stage PUs by using fat grafts. The authors selected 42 patients who showed clinical and ultrasonographic evidence of early-stage PUs. Values of skin thickness, fascial integrity, and subcutaneous vascularity were recorded both on the PU area and the healthy trochanteric one, used as control region. Fat grafting was performed on all patients. At three months, abnormal ultrasonographic findings, such as reduction of cutaneous and subcutaneous thickness, discontinuous fascia, and decrease in subcutaneous vascularity, all were modified with respect to almost all the corresponding parameters of the control region. Results highlight that the use of fat grafts proved to be an effective treatment for early-stage PUs, especially in the care of neurological and chronic bedridden patients.
authors.affiliation: Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, "Campus Bio-Medico di Roma" University, Via A. del Portillo 200, 00128 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Giovanni Francesco
authors.initials: GF
authors.lastname: Marangi
authors.affiliation: Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, "Campus Bio-Medico di Roma" University, Via A. del Portillo 200, 00128 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Tiziano
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Pallara
authors.affiliation: Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, "Campus Bio-Medico di Roma" University, Via A. del Portillo 200, 00128 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Barbara
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Cagli
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Research in Biomedical Instrumentation and Measurements, "Campus Bio-Medico di Roma" University, Via A. del Portillo 200, 00128 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Emiliano
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Schena
authors.affiliation: Division of Radiology, "Campus Bio-Medico di Roma" University, Via A. del Portillo 200, 00128 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Francesco
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Giurazza
authors.affiliation: Division of Radiology, "Campus Bio-Medico di Roma" University, Via A. del Portillo 200, 00128 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Elio
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Faiella
authors.affiliation: Division of Radiology, "Campus Bio-Medico di Roma" University, Via A. del Portillo 200, 00128 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Bruno Beomonte
authors.initials: BB
authors.lastname: Zobel
authors.affiliation: Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, "Campus Bio-Medico di Roma" University, Via A. del Portillo 200, 00128 Rome, Italy.
authors.forename: Paolo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Persichetti