Sabinsha S, Binni John
BACKGROUND Venous ulcers cause great disability and reduced quality of life if not managed appropriately. Venous leg ulcers significantly affect patients’ physiologic and psychosocial well-being. Reducing the ambulatory limb venous pressure is the cornerstone for the management of venous leg ulcers. For venous ulcers, compression therapy has been called the gold standard of wound healing. Objective of this study was to compare the effectiveness of four-layer compression bandage with conventional single layer bandage in the treatment for venous ulcer in terms of healing status, reduction in size of ulcer area at follow up points and time taken for healing. MATERIALS AND METHODS A prospective study was carried out during the study period of 12 months, from April 2016 to April 2017 among 120 patients with venous leg ulcers (60 patients with four-layer bandaging (case) and other 60 patients with conventional management (control) in the Department of General Surgery, in our institution. RESULTS The study analysis showed significantly better healing status with four-layer bandage compared to conventional management. There was significant reduction in size of ulcer area at follow up points. Time taken for complete healing was also less with four-layer bandaging but not found to be statistically significant. CONCLUSION From this study, it can be concluded that four-layer bandage is effective in attaining better healing status and achieves better reduction in size of ulcer area compared to conventional management. Time taken for healing of the ulcer was also less among the four-layer bandage group but not found to be statistically significant.
