Retrospective analysis of healing in wounds cared for by ET nurses versus staff nurses in a home setting

The continually growing home car market is seeing a higher percentage of patients with wounds. The findings of this investigation may assist the industry in determining whether the higher cost of employing ET nurses is justified. This study compared the outcome of wound care in the home setting provided by ET nurses with outcomes of wound care provided by staff nurses in the same setting. The investigation was a retrospective study of the total population of patients with wounds (n = 519) admitted to five home care agencies in central and south Florida over an 18-month period. The sample consisted of 344 wounds cared for by ET nurses and 464 wounds cared for by staff nurses. The following data were collected through retrospective review of the records: stage of wounds, descriptions of the wounds, types of wounds, number of nursing visits, number of healed wounds, and time to heal each wound. Only 36.3% of the wounds not cared for by ET nurses healed in the time the patients were seen for skilled-nursing services by the home health care agencies. Of the ET-nursed wounds, 78.5% healed. The average number of skilled-nursing visits for patients not nursed by ET nurses was less than 17. ET-nursed patients were seen an average of 31.6 visits.