Lake Norman Wound Healing Center - For Healthcare Providers

An Effective Resource for Problem Wound Management

The Lake Norman Wound Healing Center is dedicated to providing state-of-the-art, outpatient clinical wound care and hyperbaric medicine. We want you to think of our center as an extension of your practice. You maintain the care of your patient's underlying disease and continue to provide for your patient's overall care. The center only provides wound treatment.

Patients Remain in Your Care

When you refer your patient; he or she meets with our staff for a consultation, including an examination and medical history evaluation. Then, our wound care team establishes a treatment plan for your patient. Information regarding the patient's progress, along with updated photos of the wound, is submitted to you on an ongoing basis. You remain an active member of the wound care management team and the patient remains under your care.

Our Specialization is Advanced Wound Care

The coordinated use of a variety of clinical treatments, debridement, medicines, dressings and support services to treat chronic wounds has proven to be highly effective in healing problematic wounds.

When to Utilize the Center and Which Patients Benefit Most

Any patient with a wound that has not started to heal in two weeks or is not completely healed in six weeks may be a candidate for The Lake Norman Wound Healing Center. The center's staff specializes in the treatment of chronic, non-healing wounds. Some of the indications for wound therapy are:

• Pressure ulcers
• Diabetic ulcers
• Neuropathic ulcers
• Ischemic ulcers
• Venous insufficiency
• Traumatic wounds
• Surgical wounds
• Vasculitis
• Burns
• Peristomal skin irritations
• Other chronic, non-healing wounds

Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy

Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) is an adjunctive therapy in which the patient breathes 100% oxygen while enclosed in a pressurized chamber at greater-than-normal atmospheric pressure. While breathing pure O2, the patient's blood plasma becomes saturated, carrying 10 to 15 times the normal amount of oxygen to the body's tissues. The ultimate result is that the body's natural wound-healing mechanisms, which are oxygen dependent, can function more efficiently. Around 18% of wound care patients treated may require HBOT.

Approved Indications for HBOT

The following is a list of approved indications for HBOT which are currently reimbursed by Medicare, HMOs and other insurance carriers:

• Soft tissue radionecrosis
• Actinomycosis
• Preservation of compromised skin grafts and flaps
• Chronic refractory osteomyelitis
• Diabetic ulcer of the lower extremities
• Crush injury/acute traumatic peripheral ischemia
• Progressive necrotizing infections (necrotizing fasciitis)
• Acute peripheral arterial insufficiency
• Osteoradionecrosis

Other approved indications (emergent) are only treated in hyperbaric facilities staffed and equipped to provide emergency services on a 24-hour basis.

Individualized Treatment Plans

The center utilizes the newest clinical tools in wound healing along with traditional clinical practices including:

• Wound dressings
• Debridement
• Compression therapy
• Hyperbaric oxygen therapy
• Prescriptive growth factors
• Bio-engineered skin grafting
• Edema management
• Non-invasive vascular assessment

Patient care at The Lake Norman Wound Healing Center focuses on a whole body approach to wound healing including:

• Nutritional assessment and counseling
• Diabetic education
• Patient and caregiver counseling
• Pain management
• Special needs for pressure relief including beds, seat cushions and footwear