title: Reduction in wound healing times, cost of consumables and number of visits treated through the implementation of an electronic wound care system in rural Australia.
abstract: Globally, wound care costs the health care system 2-3% of the total expenditure on health, which equates to several billion dollars annually. To date, there are little data on the cost and healing rates of various wounds. This has been partly because of the difficulty in tracking wound management as the majority of wound care data has been focused on retrospective data from hospitals, general practice clinics and aged care facilities. This study reports on wound healing and cost of wounds collected from a larger project using the mobile wound care (MWC) electronic documentation system, which has been described elsewhere. The study involved 2350 clients from four health service districts in the Gippsland region in rural Australia who received treatments as part of the MWC research project (2010-2012), with a total of 3726 wounds identified (so an average of 1·6 wounds per client). By the end of the data collection period, 81% of these wounds had healed. A significant drop in healing time, cost of consumables and number of visits was found across the 3-year period.
authors: Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, School of Rural Health, Monash University, Moe, Victoria, Australia. hanan.khalil@monash.edu.
authors: Hanan
authors: H
authors: Khalil
authors: Latrobe Community Health Centre, Morwell, Victoria, Australia.
authors: Marianne
authors: M
authors: Cullen
authors: Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, School of Rural Health, Monash University, Moe, Victoria, Australia.
authors: Helen
authors: H
authors: Chambers
authors: Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, School of Rural Health, Monash University, Moe, Victoria, Australia.
authors: Matthew
authors: M
authors: Carroll
authors: Faculty of Medicine, Nursing and Health Sciences, School of Rural Health, Monash University, Moe, Victoria, Australia.
authors: Judi
authors: J
authors: Walker
mesh_terms: D000553:Ambulatory Care; D001315:Australia; D057286:Electronic Health Records; D017048:Health Care Costs; D006801:Humans; D019035:Rural Health Services / Q000458:organization & administration*; D012883:Skin Ulcer / Q000191:economics / Q000209:etiology / Q000628:therapy*; D014945:Wound Healing
keywords: Australia; Comorbidities; Mobile wound care; Wound costs; Wound healing