Documentation of preventive care for pressure ulcers initiated during annual evaluations in SCI.

Objective: Community-acquired pressure ulcers (PrUs) are a frequent cause of hospitalization of Veterans with spinal cord injury (SCI). The Veterans Health Administration (VHA) recommends that SCI annual evaluations include assessment of PrU risk factors, a thorough skin inspection and sharing of recommendations for PrU prevention strategies. We characterized consistency of preventive skin care during annual evaluations for Veterans with SCI as a first step in identifying strategies to more actively promote PrU prevention care in other healthcare encounters.Design/setting/participants: Retrospective cross-sectional observational design, including review of electronic medical records for 206 Veterans with SCI admitted to 2 VA SCI centers from January-December, 2011.Outcome measures: Proportion of applicable skin health elements documented (number of applicable elements/skin health elements documented).Results: Our sample was primarily white (78%) male (96.1%), and mean age = 61 years. 40% of participants’ ...