The motivation for the proposed project is that “Investment in the prevention of pressure ulcers is much less than the cost of treatment.” In fact, the cost of treating pressure ulcers has been estimated to be 2.5 times the cost of preventing them . Thus, pressure ulcers are high-cost adverse events across the spectrum of healthcare settings and populations including pediatric care. Pressure ulcer prevalence rates have been reported to be as high as 27% in pediatric intensive care units and as high as 23% in neonatal intensive care units. Among noncritical hospitalized pediatric patients, prevalence rates of 0.47% to 13%, and incidence rates of 0.29% to 6% have been reported . Pressure injury leads to wounds and infection and thereby negatively impact the recovery of the patient from the primary illness or injury (e.g., spinal cord) necessitating the admission. According to Baharestani and Ratliff, most pressure ulcers occur within two days of admission.

Sundaresan Jayaraman, PhD, Sungemm Park, PhD, Jana Alhart Stockwell, MD, FAAP, FCCM, Matthew Paden, MD