Determining the measurement accuracy in assessing the progress of wound healing.

Abstract

Introduction: Wound management is a challenge in terms of the way, duration and cost of treatment both for the patient and health providers. The healing of skin wounds is a highly multi-step coordinated process. Objective monitoring of treatment at every stage is necessary to assess the applied therapy.

Aim: To show the possibility of using the AutoCad software (ACS) as a tool with a slight measurement error for accurate measurement of the venous leg ulcers on the lower limbs.

Material and methods: To determine the error of the measurement method Circle Templates For Drafting for four different sizes were used as ulcer models. Seventy-six wounds of various sizes from patients with venous leg ulcers (VLUs) were photographed and outlined with a marker on a transparent foil. The wounds were measured both using ACS and digital planimetry with C-Geo software (CGS). Data were analysed using Wilcoxon test, intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and Bland-Altman analysis.

Results: The mean relative error of the surface wound model area measured by the ACS was 0.30 ±0.31% (range: 0.004-1.25) and a median of 0.18%. Areas and perimeters measured with ACS were higher than areas and perimeters measured with CGS, and the difference was statistically significant.

Conclusions: The analysis of the wound images obtained in the ACS showed a very high potential of the software in terms of the accuracy of the analysed areas, which significantly increases the possibility of the analysis and reduces the measurement error in relation to planimetry using a digital digitizer.