The Incidence of Pressure Ulcers after Open Heart Surgery and Related Factors

Pressure ulcers are due to the increased length of hospitalization in the hospital, increasing the workload and cost of health care is always important. This study aimed to investigate the incidence of pressure ulcers after open heart surgery was performed and related factors.
This was a descriptive cohort study on 250 patients underwent open heart surgery was performed in two teaching hospital in 2016. In this way, sampling day was selected randomly, but all samples were selected that day via census sampling. Data were collected through a questionnaire containing demographic & clinical contains information about before, during and after surgery, Braden scale and skin care assessment. Descriptive and inferential statistics (independent t-test, chi-square, logistic regression and multivariate) were used to analyze data.
The incidence of pressure ulcers in cardiac surgical patients was 32% that 80 out of 250 patients were pressure sores. The model Multivariate logistic regression revealed statistically significant associations between incidence of pressure ulcer with age ( more than 70 years) (p = 0.002), history of renal disease (p = 0.007), acidosis during surgery (p = 0.053), wetness and moisture of the skin during surgery (p = 0.020), use of inotropic after surgery (p = 0.000), and acidosis after surgery (p = 0.003). But there was no significant correlation between gender (p = 0.097), history of diabetes (p = 0.114), history of hypertension (p = 0.285), history of high cholesterol (p = 0.143), diastolic pressure less than 60 mm Hg during surgery (p = 0.171) and inotrope use during surgery (p = 0.153) with pressure ulcers.
Based on these findings, the incidence of pressure ulcers in cardiac surgical patients is relatively high, which especially in patients with kidney disease, a history of low diastolic blood pressure during surgery, moisture and wetness during surgery, inotrope use and acidosis after surgery have been seen. So the above is a risk for pressure ulcer occurrence therefore should be considered for these people prophylactic agents to reduce the incidence of ulcers.