An international partnership: impacting wound care in Brazil

The purpose of this article is to review nursing literature about international partnerships, describe nursing and nursing education in Brazil, and describe an international partnership about chronic wound prevention and treatment in Brazil. Because countries often share health care concerns, nursing knowledge is greater than any one country's health care trends or clinical issues. Although the literature has numerous articles about pressure ulcers and other chronic wounds, much of this information is lacking for nurses in Brazil because it is primarily written in English. This project provided educational programs in Portuguese to nurses and nursing students in Brazil, involved them in the development of wound care protocols, allowed practice with dressings, and stimulated discussions on improvement of home care to patients and families. WOC nurses have a critical global role in sharing wound care knowledge.