Qualitative study of principles pertaining to lifestyle and pressure ulcer risk in adults with spinal cord injury.

Purpose: The aim of this article is to identify overarching principles that explain how daily lifestyle considerations affect pressure ulcer development as perceived by adults with spinal cord injury (SCI).

Method: Qualitative in-depth interviews over an 18-month period with 20 adults with spinal injury and a history of pressure ulcers were conducted using narrative and thematic analyses.

Results: Eight complexly interrelated daily lifestyle principles that explain pressure ulcer development were identified: perpetual danger; change/disruption of routine; decay of prevention behaviors; lifestyle risk ratio; individualization; simultaneous presence of prevention awareness and motivation; lifestyle trade-off; and access to needed care, services and supports.

Conclusions: Principles pertaining to the relationship between in-context lifestyle and pressure ulcer risk underscore previous quantitative findings, but also lead to new understandings of how risk unfolds in everyday life situations. Pressure ulcer prevention for community-dwelling adults with SCI can potentially be enhanced by incorporating principles, such as the decay of prevention behaviors or lifestyle trade-off, that highlight special patterns indicative of elevated risk. The identified principles can be used to theoretically drive future research or to guide innovative lifestyle-focused intervention approaches. Public policies that promote short-term preventive interventions at critical junctures throughout a person's life should be considered.