Supplemental oxygen reduces wound infection

Excerpt

Supplemental oxygen in the perioperative period can be achieved simply and with minimal expense, and has been shown by this study to significantly reduce postoperative wound infection. However, no reductions in hospital stay were shown. The mechanism proposed by the authors (improved neutrophil bactericidal activity)requires validating because another possibility is that supplemental oxygen just reduces the number of anaerobic infections following colorectal surgery. It is not unusual for intensive care unit (ICU) patients to develop wound infections and it would have been interesting to know if those patients admitted to ICU all developed wound infections. In this case it could be argued that the ICU was the 'cause' of these wound infections and the results would be no longer significant if they were excluded. However, these are interesting results and if the mechanism is correct, then other infections may be reduced in situations of poor oxygen delivery to tissue. …