Wound Healing Secret Worth Millions Discovered by Home Health Nurse

[Nurse Beth, MSN]

Dear Nurse Beth,

I am an RN with 21 years in home care and I have discovered a wound healing secret. Should I find a way to market this secret as a product/trademark (will cost a lot of money that I don't have), or write a book or article, and just sell my knowledge of the secret. It's a major discovery that will save millions of dollars in wound caresupplies and heals all types of wounds quickly.

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Dear Discovered Secret,

This would be wonderful if it's true. A wound healing secret that will save millions in supplies and other healthcare costs is amazing. The wound care market is worth billions of dollars. The number of people living with chronic wounds is growing, and chronic wounds are debilitating.

Let's say that you have discovered the secret to wound care healing. If you write an article about your wound healing secret, you need to consider who would publish the article. Pick a couple of likely nursing journals and read the articles to see what type of articles they publish. Inside each journal are submission guidelines. Once it's published, copyright of the article belongs to the journal, not the author.

To sell your information, you need a buyer. Negotiating a deal with a big company, say, KCI, or Covidien, would require a patent lawyer to protect your interests.

To safeguard what you invented, you need a patent. You can patent a process or product, but not an idea. Read this article to learn more about wound patents. The categories are basically dressings, negative pressure devices, and hyperbaric oxygen delivery systems. You want to make sure a patent does not already exist for your product.

A simple first step would be to make an appointment with a patent lawyer. If you truly have a marketable product worth millions, you don't want to make a rookie mistake. On the other hand, if your product or process does not appear marketable or realistic, you need to know that as well before you invest money.

If you are interested in becoming a nurse entrepreneur, come to the National Nurses in Business Association Conference in Las Vegas this October. Last year, the nurse who invented the port-a-cath access device was there and shared her experience of being an inventor. I'll be there along with allnurses. It's for nurses like you, and any nurse who is thinking of writing a book, starting a blog, marketing her services, starting a wellness business....any and all ideas.

Best wishes,

Nurse Beth

Author, "Your Last Nursing Class: How to Land Your First Nursing Job"...and your next!

[peachtreednurse, RN]

What type of wounds? Test subjects? Data collected, photos? Over what period of time? It would indeed be a wonderful achievement!