Our View of the Top 5 Challenges in Wound Care Today

Like all areas of healthcare, there are many challenges facing wound care providers today. Finding solutions to address them will be vital to survival in today’s complex marketplace. A review of literature – and conversations with our clients and colleagues – identifies the following as among the most critical areas for wound care providers to address.

1. Increasing cost efficiencies 

Wound care costs the nation billions of dollars a year. The Agency for Healthcare Quality and Research (AHRQ) estimates the cost of individual patient care for severe pressure injuries ranges from $21,000 to more than $151,000 per pressure injury.¹ And if a patient gets a hospital-acquired pressure injury (HAPI), there are fines, penalties and hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost revenue annually. On a clinic level, revenue is often lost due to improper coding, excessive administration time, prolonged care and other issues. Finding ways to address these and other challenges remains a daily challenge for wound care providers.

2. Enhancing patient engagement and satisfaction 

All provider organizations are looking for ways to enhance patient engagement and satisfaction. Satisfaction feeds into quality and Star ratings and an organization’s ability to retain patients – and not have them seek care elsewhere. Adding clinical analytics to wound care further engages patients with their providers by giving wound care doctors and nurses the ability to access other information that may impact the wound healing trajectory, like smoking or poor nutrition. 

3. Improving quality and outcomes

The advent of value-based care and the importance of meeting accreditation guidelines like the Joint Commission add further pressure on organizations to tackle quality and outcomes. Certified EHRs can help to address both of those critical areas. CMS notes that “in order to efficiently capture and share patient data, health care providers need certified electronic health record (EHR) technology (CEHRT) that stores data in a structured format. Structured data allows health care providers to easily retrieve and transfer patient information and use the EHR in ways that can aid patient care.”² Certified EHRs are also crucial to providers looking to meet MACRA/MIPS quality-measures reporting guidelines.³ The best EHRs provide the technology to enable data submission and resources to ensure data is submitted accurately, among other features.

4. The staffing, recruitment and retention of committed providers

You’ve likely read about and/or directly experienced healthcare’s current staffing crisis. Not only is it hard to recruit candidates, but it’s also hard to retain good staff. There are many reasons people accept a position or choose to leave one. Increasingly, organizations realize that one way to hire and retain top people is to make the workplace environment more attractive. Another proven solution is to provide technology and tools that ensure staff have more time to spend on patient care.

5. Identifying and implementing optimal therapies and technologies

The wound care industry has experienced a surge in promising technologies, devices and therapies over the past few years. We’re proud to be one of those innovations. Recently, Tissue Analytics, our AI-powered wound imaging and analysis solution, was granted breakthrough device status by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), a first for the agency. Breakthrough Status indicates that the FDA believes the company’s novel diagnostic software as a medical device (SaMD) will provide more effective treatment or diagnosis of life-threatening or debilitating conditions⁴ like HAPIs, venous and diabetic foot ulcers and other non-healing wounds.  

Looking to Meet Wound Care’s Challenges Head On?

If you are looking to better address the challenges of wound care, Net Health has a solution for you. From our industry-leading Net Health Wound Care to Tissue Analytics’ groundbreaking digital imaging platform, we have a track record of improving workflow, efficiencies, managing costs and giving our clients the insights needed to improve outcomes.

Please find out more in one of our ebooks or infographics.

• The Business of Wound Care
• How Your HAPI Management Can Make or Break Your Bottom Line
• Guide to Optimize Your Wound Care Facility

References

¹AHRQ: Module 1: Preventing Pressure Injuries in Hospitals—Understanding Why Change Is Needed. 2017.

²Certified EHR Technology. CMS.Gov. March 2022. Available here.

 ³I McDonald; MACRA will have a bigger impact on hospital revenue than previously thought. Fierce Healthcare. April 2017. Available here.

⁴US Food and  Drug Administration. Breakthrough Devices Program.