Wound classification

chelojelo · Jul 22, 2005

How does everyone classify wounds besides on admit or nosocomial?
Many wounds are clinically related to the patients condition. How are we classifying these open areas? Pressure ulcers, vascular ulcers, arterial ulcers, old surgical wounds, old contact wounds, ulcers from sensitivity, reopened wounds in the healing process.
The facility I work in does a lot of wound healing so I am interested in what everyone else is doing.

I work in LTC, and have for the last 13yrs, first as an assistant, and as an LPN for the last 9yrs. We only classify wounds in stages...I, II, III, IV. The only time we classify them as anything different is when they are a surgical wound, then they aren't staged. I have never seen anything different than that. I've never seen any other wounds classified by their "cause".

tianaman · Jul 22, 2005

I work in LTC, and have for the last 13yrs, first as an assistant, and as an LPN for the last 9yrs. We only classify wounds in stages...I, II, III, IV. The only time we classify them as anything different is when they are a surgical wound, then they aren't staged. I have never seen anything different than that. I've never seen any other wounds classified by their "cause".

Hi there!!

If you don't mind, can you please elaborate on those stages of wound that you stated. thanks

Bird2 · Jul 22, 2005

Hi there!!
If you don't mind, can you please elaborate on those stages of wound that you stated. thanks

Are you wanting the descpritions of what a stage 1,2,3,4, or an unstageagle pressure ulcer looks like? If so I can send you that information this week-end. We also track all other wounds but do not stage the stasis, arterial, skin tears,rashs, or ecchymotic areas. We use a different form for these.

nursecheryl · Jul 22, 2005

In the facility we work in we classify them as decubitus, arterial, venous or surgical. We also give the stage of the wound. location, dimensions by cm, drainage amount and color. smell. If we don't document all of the above we will hear about it with the next audit. :uhoh21:

chelojelo · Jul 22, 2005

The manner in which we stage wounds would depend on their severity. For example, a stage I would be where the skin is not broken, but is reddened and the red area does not go away after turning the pt off of that area. A stage II is where the skin is actually broken open, but the wound does not involve any muscle tissue yet, and so on. We also must measure and describe the wounds on a weekly basis. Seems like the treatments for wounds are continuously changing, and from what i've seen, doesnt look like one treatment works much better than the next one, as long as the wound is getting attention, kept clean, and pressure is kept off of it. And we don't stage skin tears, scratches, etc., either...though at one time we did have this DON who insisted we stage every skin tear, scratch or sore (as in bug bite, lol) as a stage II...it was ridiculous, lots of extra time consuming work, as the wound audit book would be overflowing...and lastly, we do make sure to clarify if the wound was present upon admission.

tianaman · Jul 25, 2005

Are you wanting the descpritions of what a stage 1,2,3,4, or an unstageagle pressure ulcer looks like? If so I can send you that information this week-end. We also track all other wounds but do not stage the stasis, arterial, skin tears,rashs, or ecchymotic areas. We use a different form for these.

Yes PLEASE if you don't mind :)