Wound Management
Many seniors find themselves dealing with chronic conditions. Chronic wounds — defined as wounds that have not healed for more than thirty days — can be especially dangerous and prove challenging to treat. Left alone, they result in pain and infection; in more extreme cases, loss of function, extremities, or life may also result. If you or a loved one suffers from chronic wounds, proper care in a clinical setting is vital. For many seniors, the best option for wound care in Virginia is the treatment provided by the professionals in Princeton Health Care Center.
Understanding why wound care is so complex starts with understanding the stages of the healing process. When you are wounded, your body’s first response is hemostasis or stopping the flow of blood through clotting and vascular constriction. It is followed in short order by inflammation, where white blood cells destroy bacteria and remove cellular debris. Specialized cells called macrophages arrive to continue clearing debris, prevent infection and pave the way for tissue regrowth. Proliferation starts in the latter stages of the inflammation phase and continues after the inflammation subsides. The vascular tissue and collagen are rebuilt, and other cellular activity takes place in order to fill and cover the wound.
The last phase of wound healing is resolution, where the wound site returns to its normal state. For a minor injury, the process from hemostasis to resolution is rapid; for more severe injuries or deeper wounds, it can take a period of years.
Chronic wounds are more than an inconvenience or quality of life issue. Left untreated, they can cause severe complications, significant suffering, and literal loss of life or limb. In much the same way that Princeton Health Care Center has remained on the leading edge of elder care in other areas — including dementia care, occupational therapy, speech therapy, and long-term care — our wound care services have made a life-altering difference for many seniors in the Princeton, WV area. If you suffer from chronic wounds, contact us today to see how we can help restore you to health.
There are many ways to address chronic wounds. Your healthcare provider will evaluate your case and any treatment that’s been attempted up to that point, after which they will discuss your care options. These may include hyperbaric treatments, antibiotics, surgical intervention, or other advanced techniques. Our goal at Princeton Health Care Center is to quickly return patients to the highest level of comfort and function possible.
Benefits of Wound Care
Wounds fail to heal when any of the four steps listed above is interrupted or fails to occur. It causes problems since each step builds on or happens concurrently with the cellular “work” done during the others.
Advances in medicine help us better understand the way these complex systems work and interact. Age, hormones, certain medications, and a number of health conditions (cancer and diabetes among them) can interfere with these natural processes, but each can be treated with early detection and aggressive intervention. This helps individuals return to normal activities, experience less pain, and to suffer a lower incidence of infection, loss of limb, or loss of life.
315 Courthouse Road, Princeton, WV 24740
Princeton Health Care Center is an Equal Opportunity Employer | Owned and Operated by Princeton Memorial Company
