Chronic wounds are a silent but burdensome condition to patients, caregivers and healthcare systems (~$25bi spent by Medicare/year). Approximately 50% of wounds do not heal and one of the main reasons we identified is the gap between evidence and practice. Reasons why this happens include facts such as: medical students receive only an average of 9 hours of education on wounds. There is no residency in wound care, people learn in the trenches or at 3 day courses. Recent clinical guidelines do not address the 28 most frequent uncertainties that wound care clinicians have at the point-of-care. Medical literature is inundated with biased content that does not always take patients’ or clinicians’ best interest into consideration.
WoundReference was created to shed light on what interventions and processes have demonstrated evidence in promoting desired outcomes in wound care, and to bridge the gap between evidence and practice. By incorporating unbiased, evidence-based content and tools in our clinical and reimbursement decision support web application, we aim to work together with clinicians and patients in achieving better outcomes. We have a strict editorial process for our content that is all evidence-based, and do not take any advertisements by principle, to ensure we are free to express our unbiased opinions.
We are on a mission to help wound care professionals achieve better outcomes more efficiently. Hope you will join us.
- Elaine Song, Cofounder