Original articleCardiovascularClinical Outcome of Patients With Deep Sternal Wound Infection Managed by Vacuum-Assisted Closure Compared to Conventional Therapy With Open Packing: A Retrospective Analysis
Section snippets
Patients
Between September 1998 and September 2003, a total of 18,920 sternotomy procedures due to bypass operations and heart valve replacements were performed at the Heart Center North Rhine Westfalia. During this interval, 68 cases of deep sternal wound infections were identified in adult patients, giving an incidence of deep sternal wound infections of approximately 0.36%. Patients with sternal infections were aged 44 to 81 years, with a sex distribution of 79.5% males and 20.5% females. All
Results
Baseline characteristics of the CON group and the VAC group are presented in Table 1. On admission, both groups were comparable in age, sex distribution, anthropometric data, and preexisting diseases. Blood leukocyte counts were slightly lower and creatinine levels were slightly higher in the VAC group compared to the CON group. Hemoglobin and CRP values did not differ between the two groups on admission. Moreover, all measured biochemical factors were comparable in the two groups at diagnosis
Comment
Several recent publications suggest that the VAC technique is a very promising method in order to manage deep sternal infections 8, 9, 10, 11, 12. However, with a few exceptions 12, 13, reliable studies supporting this assumption are currently almost lacking. We present a retrospective investigation that compares the VAC technique with the so far established conventional treatment of sternal infection. We could demonstrate that the VAC technique (1) results in a more rapid decline of plasma CRP
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