Physical Therapy in Wound Care: A Cost-Effectiveness Analysis.

Area of Science:

• Wound Care
• Health Economics
• Physical Therapy

Background:

• Chronic wound management presents challenges in cost and time to complete wound closure (CWC).
• Existing treatment protocols often yield unsatisfactory outcomes.
• Venous leg ulcers (VLUs) and other chronic wounds require effective and economical management strategies.

Purpose of the Study:

• To calculate healing rates, costs, and time to CWC for chronic wounds.
• To compare wound care costs between healing and nonhealing wounds.
• To assess the cost-effectiveness of physical therapy (PT) in wound management, comparing VLUs and non-VLUs.

Main Methods:

• Retrospective cohort study utilizing deidentified patient data from a PT wound care clinic (September 2012 - January 2015).
• Analysis included 159 patients, calculating treatment duration, visits, costs (reimbursement and breakeven rates), and time to CWC.
• Comparison of outcomes between healed and nonhealed wounds, and between VLUs and non-VLUs within the healed group.

Main Results:

• A healing rate of 74.84% (119/159 patients) was achieved.
• Nonhealing wounds exhibited significantly longer treatment durations and higher costs (P < 0.01).
• In the healed group, VLUs and non-VLUs showed similar treatment duration, time to CWC, and breakeven costs, except for higher dressing costs in VLUs (P = 0.001).

Conclusions:

• Physical therapy integration in wound care demonstrates cost-effectiveness.
• PT is a viable referral option for patients requiring chronic wound management.
• Further research is recommended due to potential limitations, such as patient exclusions and unincluded physician costs.