LAUSR

BACKGROUND Negative Pressure Wound Therapy (NPWT) offers many advantages over Standard Surgical Dressings (SSDs) in the treatment of open wounds including accelerated wound healing (72.3% vs 30.8%), cost savings (up to $1,607), and reduced complication rates (35% vs 53%).2-4 Contraindicated by device manufacturers in malignancy-resected wounds for hypothesized risk of tumor recurrence, NPWT is still applied post-operatively due to limited clinical support. A systematic review with meta-analysis was performed to compare NPWT outcomes with SSDs on open wounds with our null hypotheses stating there would be no outcome differences. METHODS A systematic review of the literature on NPWT and SSDs on malignancy-resected wounds was conducted following PRISMA guidelines using PubMed, EMBASE, CINAHL, and Cochrane Central databases. Meta-analysis compared group outcomes, including malignancy recurrence, wound complication, and surgical site infection (SSI) rates, with random effects model. RESULTS 1,634 studies were identified and 27 met eligibility criteria, including 4 randomized control trials (RCTs), 4 prospective cohort studies, and 19 retrospective reviews. Eighty-one percent of papers (n = 22) recommended NPWT use in malignancy-resected wounds. Meta-analysis determined NPWT yielded significantly lower overall SSI (P = 0.004) and wound complication rates (P = 0.01) than SSDs; however, there were no statistically significant differences found for other outcomes between the two groups. CONCLUSIONS This review demonstrates favorable outcomes of NPWT over SSDs for malignancy-resected wounds without an increased risk of malignancy recurrence. However, with limited RCTs (detailing only incisional wounds for limited malignancies and anatomic regions), additional high-power RCTs are recommended.