Abstract
Two types of single-use negative-pressure wound therapy systems are currently available to treat surgical wounds: Canister-based and canisterless. This work was aimed to evaluate the performance of a canister-based vs a canisterless system, each with a different negative-pressure setting and technology for fluid management. Continuous delivery of a specified level of negative pressure to the wound bed is hypothesised to be important for promoting surgical wound healing, by achieving continuous reduction of lateral tension in the wound, particularly through decrease of skin stress concentrations around suture insertion sites. To test the above hypothesis, we developed a computational modelling framework, a laboratory bench-test for simulated clinical use and had further conducted a pre-clinical study in a porcine model for closed incision. We specifically focussed on the impact of effective fluid management for continuous delivery of a stable, consistent negative pressure and the consequences of potential losses of the pressure level over the therapy period. We found that a greater (absolute) negative-pressure level and its continuous, consistent delivery through controlled fluid management technology, by removing excess fluid from the dressing, provides far superior biomechanical performances. These conditions are more likely to result in better quality of the repaired tissues.