CNS combats pressure ulcers with skin and wound assessment team (SWAT).

Today's patients are sicker, and wound care management continues to be a challenge to healthcare professionals. With the era of patient-focused care, staff need to establish effective models for patient care. A multidisciplinary team approach to wound care was established for medical-surgical and critical care nursing units at Broward General Medical Center, Fort Lauderdale, FL, utilizing the primary roles of the CNS.

Relying on past science: nursing implications of medicinal leech therapy.

The resurgence of leech therapy is due to a need to re-establish venous circulation after micro-surgical procedures such as the reattachment of amputated body parts. Using a medicinal leech, Hirudo medicinalis, this painless procedure can drain up to 20 ml of blood at feeding and an additional amount via slow but continuous flow after feeding. Nurses play a key role before, during, and after the therapy in educating and emotionally preparing patients and families.