IWOUND MANAGEMENT Maximising wound healing EVER WONDERED: “How long will it take for this wound to heal?” EVER THOUGHT: “Will this wound ever heal and can I help it to heal faster and better? ” EVER THOUGHT : “I thought it would heal but it hasn’t!” EVER MUTTERED: “What on earth has happened to this wound – how has it got into this position and how is it going to be encouraged to heal?” Wound healing is a natural event – all wounds WANT to heal if they can. The perception that horses wounds do not heal is simply not true – there is no evolutionary advantage in a wound that does not heal. However, for sure there are differences in healing rates in different anatomic locations and in different breeds or even individuals. These are of course inherent challenges that should not divert the clinician towards a feeling of pessimism and negativity! It may seem simplistic to say that if everything that inhibits a wound is removed, it will heal fast and well, but it is true! When attending a fresh wound the clinician will need to try to identify anything in the wound that is going to adversely affect the healing process and try to take proactive, prospective steps to address the issues. On the other hand when presented with a wound that has not healed and has become either exuberant or indolent the reasons for the failure have to be identified as far as possible and this might involve delving back into the history of the wound to try to get useful information that may allow measures to be taken to eliminate the inhibitors! Removal of all inhibitors results in a really good, fast wound healing process in both fresh and chronic wounds; other measures are not usually required. The difficulty is how the inhibitors can be identified and how each of the relevant factors can be dealt with individually, spatially and temporally! Proactive steps to address the inhibitors will usually help enormously! ………. BUT WHAT ARE THEY? There are twelve main identifiable inhibiting factors that affect wounds. www.kruuse.com
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