Clinical innovations Wound management
New Zealand’s 2013 STOP Pressure Injury Day Campaign: Successes of the New Zealand Wound Care Society
aging population, increasing numbers of chronically sick patients, and tight health care cost constraints. This is true of wound care, and here the authors report a campaign to address avoidable pressure injuries.
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Authors: Carol Tweed [top] and Paula McKinnel [bottom]
BACKGROUND Most experts in tissue viability would agree that the majority of pressure injuries are the result of poor preventative strategies and can be avoided by early and simple interventions by frontline care staff alongside increased awareness involving healthcare professionals, patients, and their carers.[1]
ew Zealand faces many of the same issues as other countries around the world with an
The extent of avoidable pressure damage in New Zealand
remains unknown and there is no current requirement to undertake pressure injury prevalence or incidence auditing. Some individual District Health Boards do undertake these activities, however, without standardisation of the data collection methods and reporting, the results are challenging to interpret and impossible to compare – either with other New Zealand District Health Boards or other countries.
MAKING PRESSURE INJURY PREVENTION A PRIORITY The New Zealand Wound Care Society (NZWCS) is a voluntary organisation of healthcare professionals committed to improving outcomes and increasing quality of life for patients with wounds and skin integrity problems. One of the NZWCS’ key aims is raising awareness about pressure injuries at local, national and international levels. The Society strives to promote evidence-based practice within the New Zealand health services, and to inform policy making on wound care issues.
Multifaceted programmes that involve and engage
all levels of staff within healthcare organisations have been shown to reduce pressure injury incidence rates.[2,3]
AVOIDABLE PRESSURE INJURIES: THE NEW ZEALAND EXPERIENCE In recent years there has been an increase in both national and international awareness about quality health service provision and the associated burden of avoidable pressure injuries.[4,5]
Recent publication of the Pan Pacific Clinical
Practice Guidelines for the Prevention and Management of Pressure Injuries[6]
has assisted also and provided an
evidence-based framework. Despite these developments, no national strategic plan at Ministry level for understanding and preventing these injuries has been developed for New Zealand. Until very recently, pressure injuries were under the general umbrella of “patient safety”, rather than being specifically identified as important preventable adverse events. Medication safety, infection prevention and control, falls prevention and preventing perioperative harm all received higher priority.
STOP PRESSURE INJURY DAY For the past 2 years, the NZWCS has participated in the internationally led STOP Pressure Injury Day. This initiative was established in 2012 by the Spanish National Group for the Study of Pressure Ulcer Prevention and chronic wounds (GNEAUPP) and Ibero–Latin–American Society on Wounds (SILAHUE) following the Declaration of Rio De Janerio on Pressure Ulcer Prevention as a universal human right in October 2011. The purpose of this annual day is to increase awareness of pressure injuries to the public, professionals, and politicians, and to highlight how pressure injuries are a major healthcare problem, as well as how they can be almost completely avoided with appropriate interventions. The European Pressure Ulcer Advisory Panel, acknowledging and applauding this work, joined and encouraged countries internationally to participate (
www.epuap.org/stop- pressure-ulcer-day). The NZWCS’ 2013 STOP Pressure Injury Day campaign was in-line with the wider international programme objectives as above. Knowing that great work had already been done in other countries, and that we had limited time and finances, we set about making contact and building relationships with local and international key opinion leaders and organisations. These contacts included Jacqui Fletcher (UK) as the leader of the highly successful “Stop the Pressure” campaign that had been developed by NHS Midlands and East in 2012. The NHS Midlands and East kindly shared their concepts and resources for the campaign, all of which had been widely tested with users – saving the NZWCS time and giving us confidence that the message was appropriate. Locally, we were grateful to receive the support of a
range of organisations. Engaging with industry to assist in the distribution of resources gave a wider depth of health
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Wounds International Vol 5 | Issue 2 | ©Wounds International 2014 |
www.woundsinternational.com
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