BACTERIAL BURDEN IN WOUNDS
High bacterial load contributes to chronicity of wounds and is diagnosed based on assessment of clinical signs and symptoms (CSS) of infection, but these characteristics are poor predictors of bacterial burden. Point-of-care fluorescence imaging (FL) can improve identification of wounds with high bacterial burden (>104 CFU/g). FL detects bacteria, whether planktonic or in biofilm, but does not distinguish between the two. In this study, diagnostic accuracy of FL was compared to CSS during routine wound assessment … read more