Reliability of wound measuring techniques in an outpatient wound center

Wound measurements determine whether treatment(s) should be continued or changed. A busy wound clinic must rely on many different personnel for wound measurements. The realization that using a variety of measurement techniques could effect medical treatment choices raised concerns. To determine the inter-rater reliability of wound measuring techniques used by clinical staff in an outpatient wound center, three approaches to wound measurement were studied with the intent to standardize clinic procedures in the authors' facilities and to use the method with greatest inter-rater reliability. An exploratory descriptive study was initiated in a busy multidisciplinary wound-healing clinic in a northeastern Ohio 500-bed teaching and community hospital. Participants included 16 wound care professionals who staff an outpatient wound center. Inter-rater reliability measures were compared to three measurement techniques. The intraclass correlation coefficient was used as the statistical measure of inter-observer agreement. After comparing measurements made by the usual method used by an individual, the clockwise method, and the perpendicular method, the perpendicular method showed clear superiority in agreement among clinicians (ICC .962; df = 11,143; P = < 0.001) as compared to the clock-wise method (ICC .682; df = 11,154; P = < 0.05). This study provided a basis for standardizing the approach to wound measurement among physicians and nursing personnel and has important implications for effective medical care, research, and healthcare cost savings.