ABSTRACT
Pressure sores are a serious concerns in that respect to increasing risk of medical complications and medical costs. Prevention and care of pressure sores is an essential area of nursing practice. The nurse at ICU should be more careful of maintaining the skin integrity of patients expecially than at any other place. This study was conducted to determine if the risk factors of pressure sores and nutritional status of the patients at risk for pressure sores is related the occurrence of pressure sore. The risk group refers the patients having the below 14 scores of the braden scale. The 100 subjects were recruited from the ICU ward at an university hospital in Choong-Nam. The parameters for nutritional status are the blood chemistry including plasma protein, albumin, hemoglobin and the anthropometric measurements consisting of weight, LBM, the proportion of body fat, body fluid and triceps skin fold using biompedence analyzer and calipers. The results are as follows : 1. The subjects were 55 years and stayed 8 days on average. Of the 100 subjects, males were 61%, neurologic/neurosurgical disease were 68% and the incidence of pressure sores was 17% mainly occurring within 3 days after the admission. 2. The present paralysis(or paraplegia) and edema(arm, leg, trunk) were showed more significantly the subjects with pressure sores than those without pressure sores. 3. Regarding with the nutritional status, the subjects with pressure sores had significantly lower the weight, BMI, LBM, body fluid, albumin than the ones without pressure sores. This results were supported the reports of previous studies that the decreased weight and albumin could be the important predictors of pressure sores. Thereafter we should encourage these factors to be utilized in predicting pressure sores for a comprehensive assessment. Nurse should identify patients at risk of the development of pressure sores, assess their nutritional status and dietary intake at regular intervals.