The dissemination of wound management guidelines: a national survey

In 2009, the Health Service Executive (Ireland) launched the first national guidelines for wound management. The Wound Management Association of Ireland (WMAI) participated in their development and dissemination. This study aimed to determine how aware of the guidelines members of the WMAI were, how they became aware of them, and if they had disseminated them further.

130 members of the WMAI were surveyed. The questionnaire was developed using previous questionnaires assessing dissemination as a reference and was reviewed by the executive panel for face and construct validity.

The response rate was 55% (72/130). Fifty-seven per cent (n=41) had attended education sessions in which the guidelines were on the agenda. These included WMAI local events (43%), work events (16%), industry sponsored events (10%) and college course (7%). Fifty-one per cent had heard about the guidelines from the WMAI national conference. Eighty-five per cent had informed others of the guidelines, 70% had given a copy to others. Seventeen per cent (n=12) had given a presentation about the guidelines. Of these, five had given one presentation; two had given four and two had given five. Seventy-five per cent of which were at work. Currently, 56% of people are working on implementation. While full-text, 'hard' copies were not printed, people still requested these and 47% downloaded the full-text for their own use.

Clinical practice guidelines are vital for the provision of evidence based health care. However, they are ineffective unless disseminated and implemented. Wound care organisations are able to play a key role in dissemination and feedback from this survey suggests that this has been achieved.