The day-to-day responsibility for wound management is usually undertaken by nurses. It includes assessing the wound, selecting an appropriate treatment and evaluating the patient’s progress. To do this effectively the nurse needs to understand the healing process, recognise factors that may delay wound healing, understand how wound healing can be optimised, know how to recognise complications if they arise and know how to treat them. Only with a thorough understanding of these areas will it be possible to make a detailed assessment of the patient and the wound, and make a clinical decision on treatment that will be clinically effective
