The project is focused on developing an advanced wound dressing that will assist patients’ needs and lessen pressure on public healthcare resources.
A disruption of skin continuity is called a wound. After an injury, a wound healing processes begin that involve several key stages. Wounds that fail to proceed through these stages in timely and orderly manner that results in re-producing anatomic and functional integrity of the injured tissue are considered chronic.
It has been estimated that 1 to 2% of the population will experience a chronic wound during their lifetime. This condition alone takes up to 3% of the healthcare budgets in developed countries. It is set to rise by 30% annually, partly due to aging population but also due to advances in wound dressing materials. They result in rising costs of wound care because technological advances which can increase efficiencies in the healthcare system over the longer term often increase the short term costs.
The pace of population ageing is much faster than in the past. According to Eurostat 2019 baseline year projections, it is envisaged that by 2025 people aged 65 years and older, will account for 21.9 % of the EU-27’s population as compared with 20.2% in 2020. The predictions for 2050 estimate that people aged 65 years and older will account for 29.4% of the EU population while the total population will decrease thus rising demands on healthcare budgets even more.
Chronic wounds are strongly correlated with age. One of the reasons why elderly are more prone to this condition is that wound repair slows down as the body ages. Older people often suffer from polymorbidities (the co-occurrence of at least two chronic health conditions). These, especially diabetes, obesity, tobaccoism, coronary and vein diseases, which are typical issues for elderly, further increase the probability of complications and prevalence of chronic wounds.
The vast majority of chronic wounds fall into one of three categories: vascular (venous and arterial), diabetic and pressure ulcers (also known as ‘bed sores’). The chronic wounds in diabetic patients (diabetic foot) often lead to limb amputation or death.
Nowadays there is a tendency to discharge patients with chronic wounds from hospitals and transfer the burden of attending to their needs to community services, carers and families. Thus a lay person without medical education and experience may become responsible for therapy between doctor’s visits. This situation can lead to more frequent GP appointments (some of them unnecessary) or to underestimating patient’s complaints and more complications.
To summarize: chronic wounds are a serious medical condition that influence all society and have a growth curve which is getting steeper. The overall objective of the project is to develop a functional sample of a ‘smart’ easily readable dressing, which will have built-in specific sensors that can assess patient condition objectively, a dressing that could lead to mass production of an affordable product that will alleviate patients’ suffering, shorten the recovery time, relieve carers’ workload and lessen the strain on the healthcare expenditure associated with aging society.
