How being skin tear aware can help patients and clinicians understand and manage skin tears
Skin tears are painful and distressing injuries that occur more often than people may realise. Unfortunately, a lack of awareness about what causes skin tears can lead to misidentification and mistreatment which in turn, can lead to pain and suffering.
What causes skin tears?
At some stages of life, skin can become vulnerable, fragile and less resilient to everyday bumps and bruises. This results in skin becoming more vulnerable to skin tears – traumatic wounds that cause pain and reduce quality of life for patients.
When skin is vulnerable, any everyday bump can become a skin tear. The International Skin Tears Advisory Panel (ISTAP) defines skin tears as follows: ‘A skin tear is a traumatic wound caused by mechanical forces, including removal of adhesives. Severity may vary by depth (not extending through the subcutaneous layer).’1
By recognising patients who are at risk, preventing skin injuries, and using skin tear management guidelines, patients can be spared unnecessary pain and suffering.
A wound that’s easy to miss
Skin tears are high-risk, acute wounds but they may not always present as such. They are often missed, misdiagnosed or mistreated, resulting in a skin tear becoming a more complicated wound. Not only does this make skin tear care more difficult and more expensive, it also prolongs healing and impacts the quality of life for the patient.
A wound that’s easy to treat
Although they can be easily missed, skin tears are fortunately easy to treat with the right tools and training, and the right skin tear care plan. Collaboration across care settings is important to ensure nurses, carers and healthcare professionals can access the information they need for every stage of skin tear management – from skin tear prevention and skin care classification through to choosing the most effective skin tear dressing. When assessed accurately and treated correctly, skin tears can heal within approximately four weeks.1
How to heal skin tears: focus on the flap
When you know what to look for, skin tears are much simpler to identify and treat successfully. The first thing to assess is the skin flap. This will help you diagnose whether the wound is a skin tear, and assess its severity. You can then follow the skin tear management guidelines set out in our skin tear treatment protocol.
Download our ISTAP-approved algorithm of care infographic
How do you get healing off to the best start?
Making the best skin tear dressing selection can significantly improve treatment, as proven in a Randomised Controlled Trial (RCT). In this video, Dr Kevin Woo explains the effectiveness of soft silicone dressings for skin tear repair compared with local practice where soft silicone dressings are not used.2
How do you promote healing when changing dressings?
It’s important to always apply dressings gently and make sure they are removed in the correct direction. This avoids disturbing the skin flap, causing pain and distress, and disrupting healing. Mepitel® One features a simple removal symbol to optimise healing progress across dressing changes.
How do you treat skin tears with high levels of exudate?
At Mölnlycke, we have developed Mepilex® Border Flex, our next generation of flexible dressings, for skin tears with total flap loss and/or higher levels of exudate.3
Be skin tear aware
By educating yourself and other members of your team, you can play a key role in helping to reduce the unnecessary pain and suffering caused by skin tears. Mölnlycke’s Clinical Learning Hub provides flexible and on-demand training and education, including:
- a series of educational webinars on skin tears prevention and management
- an e-learning module on skin tear classification
- additional information and educational resources.
Visit our Clinical Learning Hub
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References
- LeBlanc K et al. Best practice recommendations for the prevention and management of skin tears in aged skin. Wounds International, 2018. Available to download from www.woundsinternational.com
- Woo K., LeBlanc K. A randomised controlled pragmatic study to evaluate the use of silicone dressings for the treatment of skin tears. Poster presentation at Wound Con Summer (virtual) conference, 2020.
- Nelson, D. Better Outcomes for Skin Tears with New 5 Layer Bordered Foam Dressings. Poster Presentation. WOCN Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, PA 2018
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