Quantitative data collection/analysis

Q3 Analysis

 This study tries to see if patients at risk for pressure ulcers will have diminished incidence of pressure sores during the Allevyn (the product in this study) trial period. According to the discussion section of this research, it was revealed during the 7-month period of the study that incidence of pressure ulcers on areas that are more commonly affected like the sacral area have decreased in all 3 ICUs (Byrne et al., 2016, p. 234). This is consistent with the results (Table 3) where the data show a decrease in incidence of pressure ulcers during the trail phase in all Intensive Care Units. Different values of p are calculated on each units (Surgical Coronary Care p = 0.08, Medical Coronary Care p = 0.31, and Medical Intensive Unit p = 0.27); this measures the results’ significance as compared to the incidence rate ratio of each unit.

            This study had some instances that could have potentially introduced bias into the results. Due to the design of the study (prospective study/cohort), they were unable to collect demographic data, creating a lack of comparison between pretrial samples and population. There are risk factors that could have been a\unaccounted between these two populations. The study had also used convenience trial that only looked at the feasibility of samples instead of using randomized sampling. A lot of the samples (n = 43) were also eliminated due to incomplete documentation. A lot of interventions by the multidisciplinary hospitals in the study to improve pressure ulcer outcome of patients could have also affected the results of this study. (Byrne et al., 2016, p. 233). These limitations should be accounted for in further studies regarding the use of Allevyn for pressure ulcers to eliminate bias in the results.

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Q2 Collection/Intervention

For seven months, a screening tool was developed to determine patients who were at a higher risk of developing pressure ulcers at the sacrum coccyx and buttocks. To prepare a collection of data, each participating ICU evaluated criteria to be used when collecting the data.

Nurses were asked to assess the patient using the screening criteria developed and apply dressing as pressure ulcer prophylaxis. They were later on asked to evaluate the dressing in terms of wear time, the comfort of the patient, and also the ability to reposition it, and lastly, the patient's safety (Byrne et al., 2016, p.234). The nurses reported that clear fluids and blisters had formed because of the sacral dressing.

The intervention phase occurred in November, where the patients were admitted to the 3 ICUs, and they got assessed by a registered nurse, the dressing used in this study was the Allevyn gentle Border Sacrum dressing (Byrne et al., 2016, p.233). An assessment was conducted by a registered nurse after every 12 hours and documented in the electronic medical record and data collection tool. Skin assessments were conducted and documented on the data tool, and once the data documentation was completed, it was collected weekly by the clinical specialist nurse (Byrne et al., 2016, p.234).  The results of 43 patients were not documented, and their dressing was applied. The data was not documented because there were several initiatives taking place and that they focused on the prevention of pressure ulcers.

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