UMMC invited community members into the hospital today to see two new hyperbaric chambers installed as a key part of a new wound center.
There's an increase nationwide in patients developing non-healing wounds, particularly foot wounds, and hyperbaric chambers have proven effective in treating such them.
The wound center is an outpatient clinic.
For more details, click on the headline above to read the full press release from UMMC.
Photos: Brooke Eck, RT, assists Christopher White, UMMC foundation board president, with a demonstration of the chamber.
Press release:
United Memorial Medical Center is pleased to announce that we added a new service line to our growing hospital system: a specialized Wound Care Center®. This additional service allows United Memorial to offer a more comprehensive wound care program to manage chronic or non-healing wounds caused by diabetes, circulatory problems, and other conditions.
The advanced center will house two new hyperbaric chambers and four treatment rooms in the 3,800-square-foot facility. The center, located at the Hospital at 127 North St., Batavia opened with limited services on Sept. 27, 2011. This week, the center became fully operational.
The United Memorial Wound Care and Hyperbaric Medicine Center is designed to complement the services offered by patients' primary care physicians – in fact, we should think of it an extension of a physician’s practice. Patients will receive outstanding, professional and courteous attention in a timely fashion, and will always be returned to the referring physician once the healing is satisfactory. This addition is part of our goal to provide a complete system of medical and professional care to our patients.
The United Memorial Wound Care and Hyperbaric Medicine Center is an outpatient, hospital-based program that works in conjunction with the patient’s primary care physician. Open Monday through Friday, from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., the program operates by appointment. Patients may call directly for an assessment or seek referral from the primary care physician.
Addressing a Growing Need
The decision to start an outpatient center devoted exclusively to wound care reflects several key factors: an unmet need in the community, an overall increase in chronic non-healing wounds, and access to proven therapies that speed the healing process and deliver excellent clinical outcomes.
Non-healing wounds of the diabetic foot are considered one of the most significant complications of diabetes, representing a major worldwide medical, social, and economic burden that greatly affects patient quality of life. Almost 24 million Americans — one in every 12 — are diabetic and the disease is causing widespread disability and death at an epidemic pace, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Of those with diabetes, 6.5 million are estimated to suffer with chronic or non-healing wounds. Associated with inadequate circulation, poorly functioning veins, and immobility, non-healing wounds occur most frequently in the elderly and in people with diabetes — populations that are sharply rising as the nation ages and chronic diseases increase.
Although diabetes can ravage the body in many ways, non-healing ulcers on the feet and lower legs are common outward manifestations of the disease. Also, diabetics often suffer from nerve damage in their feet and legs, allowing small wounds or irritations to develop without awareness. Given the abnormalities of the microvasculature and other side effects of diabetes, these wounds take a long time to heal and require a specialized treatment approach for proper healing.
As many as 25 percent of diabetic patients will eventually develop foot ulcers, and recurrence within five years is 70 percent. If not aggressively treated, these wounds can lead to amputations. It is estimated that every 30 seconds a lower limb is amputated somewhere in the world because of a diabetic wound. Amputation often triggers a downward spiral of declining quality of life, frequently leading to disability and death. In fact, only about one third of diabetic amputees will live more than five years, a survival rate equivalent to that of many cancers.
Many of these lower extremity amputations can be prevented through an interdisciplinary approach to treatment involving a variety of therapies and techniques, including debridement, dressing selection, special shoes, and patient education. When wounds persist, a specialized and holistic approach is required for healing.
The Case for Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy
HBOT is a safe and evidence-based treatment proven to speed the healing process in certain types of wounds. During the treatments, the patient breathes 100 percent oxygen inside a pressurized chamber, quickly increasing the concentration of oxygen in the bloodstream, where it is delivered to a patient's wound site for faster healing. Essentially, HBOT therapy helps heal the wound from the inside out. This therapy can help reduce swelling, fight infection, and build new blood vessels, ultimately producing healthy tissue. It is also effective in fighting certain types of infections, improving circulation, in stimulating growth of new blood vessels, and in treating crush injuries, osteomyelitis, compromised skin grafts and flaps, late-stage radiation injury, and brown recluse spider bites.
HBOT is used as an adjunctive treatment for problematic, non-healing wounds that meet specific criteria, and it is expected that 20 percent of the wound care cases will meet those criteria. The addition of these chambers will improve the already successful clinical results of the center and will drive approximately 40 percent of the center's revenue.
Throughout HBO therapy, the patients are monitored to see if the concentration of oxygen has increased in the blood near the wound. If the oxygen level is higher, the therapy is most likely beneficial to the patient. A typical course of treatment involves the patient spending about 90 minutes a day in the chamber five days per week over a four-to-six-week period.
Why Outsource the Management of the Center to Diversified Clinical Services?
Through a partnership with Diversified Clinical Services (DCS), we are able to offer a new and comprehensive center of excellence for specialized wound care and hyperbaric medicine. DCS is the world’s largest wound care management company with over 300 hospital partners delivering excellent evidence-based care to patients with chronic wounds. DCS has been the leader in wound care for more than 20 years, offering the most advanced modalities such as adjunctive hyperbaric oxygen therapy.
Of special importance to our hospital, DCS Centers traditionally achieve excellent clinical outcomes, including high limb salvage rates, an 88 percent healing rate within 31 median days-to-heal, and extremely high patient satisfaction. Additionally, DCS-managed Wound Care Centers effectively utilize HBOT therapy to heal more than 35,000 diabetic wounds each year, providing more HBOT therapy than any other wound care provider in the world.
Wound Care Center Benefits Patients, the Hospital, and the Community
For all involved, the center is a win-win endeavor. Chronic or non-healing wound patients benefit from an interdisciplinary model of care and advanced healing modalities. These often problematic patients heal more quickly, have an improved quality of life, and, in the vast majority of cases, avoid amputation of limbs.
The hospital benefits through the improved continuum of care and a specialized outpatient center exists for physicians to refer problem wound patients. New patients are admitted under hospital care and the revenue losses due to wound-related re-admittances and long lengths of stay are reduced, all while increasing returns through this new service line. In many cases, center quality is a factor when being considered for national quality awards and Center of Excellence designations. All of this allows the hospital to better serve the community.
