Wound infection rate after skin closure of damage control laparotomy with wicks or incisional negative wound therapy: An EAST multi-center trial.

Damage control laparotomy (DCL) has a high risk of SSI and as an attempt to mitigate this, surgeons often leave the skin open to heal by secondary intention. A recent retrospective study showed that DCL wounds could be closed with the addition of wicks or incisional wound vacs with acceptable rates of wound infection. The aim of this prospective trial was to corroborate these results. This is a prospective multicenter observational trial performed by 7 institutions from July 2020 to April 2022. Adult patients who underwent DCL and fascia/skin closure with the addition of wicks or an incisional wound vac were included. Patients who died within seven days of DCL were excluded. Demographics, mechanism of initial presentation, wound classification, antibiotics given, surgical site infections, procedures performed, and mortality data was collected. Fisher's Exact test was used for categorical data and Wilcoxon Rank Sum test for continuous data. Mean days to closure was assessed using Student's t-test for independent groups. P-values <0.05 were considered indicative of statistical significance. Over the 21-month period, a total of 119 patients analyzed. Most patients were male (n = 66, 63 %), and the average age was 51 years. The average number of days the abdomen was kept open was 2.6. A majority of the DCLs were performed on acute care patients (n = 76, 63.8 %) and 92 patients (77.3 %) had a wound classification of contaminated or dirty. Most of the patients' skin was closed with wicks in place (68.9 %). There was a 9.8 % infection rate in patient's skin closed with wicks versus 16.2 % closed with an incisional wound vac (p = 0.361). Although the wick group had a higher proportion of class III and IV wound types, patients primarily treated with wicks had a lower risk of wound infection compared to those treated with incisional wound VACs; however, this difference was not statistically significant.

Delayed Presentation of Patients with Hip Fractures during the COVID-19 "Stay-at-Home" Order in the Southmost Region of the United States.

To evaluate the effects of COVID-19 and stay-at-home orders in traumatic hip fractures presentation, we conducted a retrospective chart review cohort study from March 13 to June 13 in 2020 compared to 2019 from a single-hospital Trauma Level 2 Center. Males and females, 18 years of age and older presenting with a diagnosis of displaced or nondisplaced, intracapsular, or extracapsular hip fracture, underwent standard of care-comparative analysis of the patient's characteristics and clinical outcomes. The primary study outcomes included age, sex, ethnicity, and body mass index, the onset of injury, date of arrival, payer, the primary type of injury and comorbidities, mechanism of injury, treatment received, postoperative complications, days in an intensive care unit (ICU), discharge disposition, pre- and postinjury functional status, and COVID-19 test. Age, sex, ethnicity, and body mass index were similar in the patients in 2019 compared to 2020. The patients' average age was 76 years old, 80% reported Hispanic ethnicity, and 63% of the patients were females. Most injuries (90%) occurred due to falls. On average, patients in 2020 presented 4.8 days after the injury onset as compared to 0.7 days in 2019 (p < 0.05). There was an increase in displaced fractures in 2019 compared to 2020 and an increase in patients' disposition into rehabilitation facilities compared to skilled nursing facilities. Despite the delay in presentation, length of stay, days in the ICU, or functional outcomes of the patients were not affected. Although the patients showed a delayed presentation after hip fracture, this does not appear to significantly interfere with the short-term or the 6-month mortality outcomes of the patients, suggesting the possibility of guided delayed care during times of national emergency and increased strain in hospital resources.