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Silicone Foam Dressing for Prevention of Sacral Deep Tissue Injuries Among Cardiac Surgery Patients
Robyn Strauss1, Ave Preston, Demetra C Zalman
1At the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Robyn Strauss, ACNS-BC, MSN, RN, WCC, is Clinical Nurse Specialist, Level VI; Ave Preston, ACNS-BC, MSN, RN, CWOCN, is an Ostomy & Wound Clinical Nurse Specialist; Demetra C. Zalman, MSN, CRNP, WCC, is an Acute Care Nurse Practitioner, Cardiac Surgery; and Aditi D. Rao, PhD, RN, is Director of Nursing Practice. The authors have disclosed no financial relationships related to this article. Submitted September 25, 2018; accepted in revised form November 13, 2018.
Objective:
To evaluate the effect of silicone foam dressings, placed preoperatively, on the incidence of postoperative sacral deep-tissue pressure injuries.
Design, Setting, And Patients:
An uncontrolled before-and-after quality improvement method was used. Within a single, urban academic medical center, consecutively admitted adult cardiac surgery patients were included in the pre- and postintervention groups; only those receiving elective procedures were included.
Intervention:
Nurses applied a sacral silicone foam dressing preoperatively. This dressing was maintained on the patient's sacrum intraoperatively and postoperatively for up to 5 days in the intensive care and step-down units.
Main Results:
This project demonstrated a clinically significant decrease (P < .02) in the incidence of postoperative sacral deep-tissue pressure injuries from 2.3% (preintervention, n = 300) to 0% (postintervention, n = 224). These results were sustained for 24 months after the trial was completed.
Conclusions:
The use of silicone foam dressings may be an effective prophylactic intervention to reduce the incidence of perioperative deep-tissue pressure injuries among cardiac surgery patients, a high-risk population.
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