Implementing a Chronic Wound Care Curriculum for Internal Medicine Residents

The objective of this study was to determine if participation in a practice-based learning session would change the residents' reported wound care practice.

A 90-minute didactic and skills workshop in chronic wound care was provided to 89 internal medicine (IM) residents divided into 4 groups, who were asked to complete an anonymous clinical vignette survey prior to the session and again 3 months after the practice-based learning session.

Comparisons of the pretest and posttest scores (Mann-Whitney U Test) showed only ordering moisture-retentive dressing changed significantly. Residents reported likelihood of preventing/managing wounds in their future career on a 10-point Likert scale (mean 4.92).

Future directions aimed at assessing the wound care needs/resources of the IM outpatient clinics, the comfort of the supervising clinicians and residents, and targeting the curriculum to those most likely to benefit should be addressed before further refining the curriculum.