Wound care service

A flexible service

Designed to support practices, our flexible service covers patients in Burgess Hill, East Grinstead, Haywards Heath, Horsham and Hurstpierpoint. Crawley patients will be continue to be managed within the existing Planned Treatment Centre service.

Our service can be used for patients discharged from secondary care who require ongoing wound management and those currently being managed within general practice that meet the criteria for the Supplementary Wound Care Service, including:

• Post operative dressings and suture removal 
• Post A&E dressings and suture removal

We can treat the majority of wounds:

• Post operative dressings and suture removal (unless covered as part of another locally commissioned service such as minor surgery) 
• Post A&E dressings and suture removal 
• Patients with leg ulceration not requiring compression bandaging (see exclusions below) 
• Simple burns 
• Haematoma where required 
• Fungal infections requiring wound management 
• Wounds following minor injury 
• Varicose eczema/contact dermatitis/skin allergy.   
• Dehisced surgical wounds (not requiring compression bandaging and once patient has been discharged by their surgical team) 
• Leaky legs – maintenance only within the scope of general practice and pending appointment with lymphoedema clinic 
• Cellulitis 
• Wounds requiring packing 

The following are currently out of scope:

• Venous leg ulcers where compression bandaging is required
• Compression bandaging
• Arterial leg ulcers
• Ankle Brachial Pressure Index assessment/treatment
• Doppler assessment/test
• Necrosis or circulation impairment
• Wounds that have not healed within three months

The service cannot be used for dressings and wound care as part of a locally commissioned service such as minor surgery or minor injury. Only ambulatory patients can be booked into the service.  Housebound patients should be managed by their normal practice. 

How to use this service

Patients can be booked on an ad hoc basis directly into the service using the practice clinical system.