I hate wound care terminology

AngelKissed857, BSN, RN · Jun 9, 2018

There are some amazing charts and cheat sheets on Pinterest. And honestly, if you are describing the wound in a way other people can visualize- you're probably fine.

Davey Do · Jun 9, 2018

Remember "Proud Flesh"?

It referred to a German rock band formed around 1970.

And, there are 50 Eskimo words for snow.

Everything's more complicated nowadays, isn't it Emergent?

brownbook · Jun 9, 2018

I never had to deal with wounds a lot, so would feel exactly like you. But this was before the Internet.

I think I'll Google wound images.

Something only a nurse would say! :yes: .

Yucky, I forgot looking at pictures is much worse than seeing the real thing.

Davey Do · Jun 9, 2018

Yucky

I find it so attractive when you female nurses talk techy.

inthecosmos, BSN, MSN, RN, APRN · Jun 9, 2018

The language these days is dictated by payment...

KarenMS · Jun 9, 2018

I expressed my concern with using the wrong descriptive words when I rounded with the wound team during orientation. They assured me I really can't go wrong just writing what I see, in any words I see fit.

mtmkjr, BSN · Jun 9, 2018

I used to be disgusted by wounds and dreaded treatments and dressings. I couldn't imagine why anyone would make it their specialty... Now I am finding it more and more fascinating and I look forward to following the wound care nurse around on my patients trying to learn all that I can!

One of the things I want to get more comfortable with is using correct terminology.

AngelKissed857, BSN, RN · Jun 9, 2018

I love wound care, am fascinated by the puzzle of healing wounds. Excited to start the CWOCN program at Cleveland Clinic in August!

KatieMI, BSN, MSN, RN · Jun 9, 2018

One time in LTACH we got a patient from low level group home with mysterious symptoms and wound on his abdomen. The group home had no RN on premices, only one LPN who clearly left school around the time when the last dinosaurs roamed the Earth. She was locally known for very detailed and very unprofessionally expressed documentation.

That time, the description sounded approximately like this: a hole wide enough to pass two my gloved fingers; upon taking them out, they smelled like Sloppy Joe patient just ate, but a good deal rotten.

It was gastrocolonic fistula, after all. The food passed directly from stomach to transwerse colon and from there out farther away or on skin. We were thinking long time who else would imagine sticking fingers into that badly looking "hole" and then smelling them, noticing what was eaten an hour before.

Orion81RN · Jun 9, 2018

Ugh...I hear ya. I currently have a private duty patient who came back from the hospital with a huge wound where her PICC was. I'm having a heck of a time describing it in charting. Especially considering we don't know how it happened. It looks like a big burn that has scabbed over. I want to write that it is eschar, but I'm not really sure. So we've just been writing, "burn like wound with black scab," with measurements.

It doesn't help that the mom is NOT following up with wound doc appt nor putting Medihoney on it as the orders state. So frustrating.

allnurses Guide · Jun 9, 2018

I really admire wound care specialists. I'm so bad at it. When I am forced to describe a wound or skin problem I always have to resort to layman talk; scabby, flaky, reddened, etc.
Wound care terminology is like an eskimo describing snow.

I really like Brownbrooks description of yucky!. I did get pretty good at wound description and care at my last job where a followed the wound care doctor around with the treatment cart. He was a great teacher. They don't like my talent so much at my current facility because any new wound is cause for an A or B citation so the facility likes to pretend they are not there. I have explained to admin that new wounds that happen in-facility are different than wounds they come in with. Our psych patients are ambulatory but some of them are homeless and have really ugly wounds on their feet and heels.

We do our best

Hppy