Abstract
Incisional negative wound pressure therapy (iNPWT) use on closed incisions has been shown to improve wound outcomes, but no studies have evaluated the use of iNPWT following brachiobasilic transposition arteriovenous fistula (BBT-AVF). We aim to investigate the efficacy of iNPWT vs conventional wound therapy in reducing surgical site infections (SSIs) for BBT-AVF incisions. This is a retrospective cohort study of patients who underwent BBT-AVF creation between January 2010 and December 2017. A 1:2 propensity score matching (PSM) was performed to reduce selection bias and address for confounding factors. Study outcomes included SSI and haematoma incidence, 30-day readmission, and 30-day mortality. A total of 154 patients were reviewed in this study: 47 (30.5%) had iNPWT and 107 (69.5%) had conventional wound therapy. The overall median age was 60.5 (interquartile range 54-69). PSM with a 1:2 ratio resulted in a total of 117 patients (39 iNPWT and 78 conventional wound therapy). In the unmatched cohort, SSI incidence was lower in the iNPWT group (n = 1/47 [2.1%] vs n = 14/107 [13.1%], P = .035). However, incidence of SSI was comparable between iNPWT and conventional wound therapy after matching (n = 1/39 [2.6%] vs n = 9/78 [11.5%], P = .102). There was no significant difference in 30-day readmission and 30-day mortality. Within our study population of patients with BBT-AVF incisions, there is a non-statistically significant reduction in SSI incidence for patients who received iNPWT as compared with conventional wound therapy. Further prospective randomised controlled studies should be conducted to validate these findings.