Key among the nasty problems caused by lymphedema, a common cardiovascular disease that causes limb and trunk swelling, is the risk of skin infection. Lymphedema causes the skin to thicken and become inelastic, which open the doors for infection to enter more easily; according to Stanford’s Stanley Rockson, MD, about 25 percent of lymphedema patients experience recurring infections that can result in hospitalization.
Thus the results of a recent study published in JAMA Dermatology offers some exciting news, says Rockson, a world renowned expert in lymphedema.
The fact that we saw dramatic reductions in the incidence in rate of infections... is very noteworthy
In the study, an advanced model of a pneumatic compression device used to treat lymphedema was found to reduce skin infections from the disease by nearly 80 percent. Rates of cellulitis, the medical term for such skin infections, were lowered from 21 percent to 4.5 percent in the people with lymphedema due to cancer and from 28.8 percent to 7.3 percent in individuals whose lymphedema was not due to cancer.
Pneumatic compression devices, which have been in use for decades, are inflatable garments that when applied to the swollen area of the skin inflate and deflate in cycles to help drain lymph fluid build up. Most of these devices simply apply an increasing degree of pressure from the garment, but the model used in this study goes a step further. As Rockson, a co-author on the study, explains in a podcast accompanying the journal article:
This device works not just by adding pressure... It actually intends to simulate the intervention used by physical therapists when they do manual lymphatic massage. It places very low pressure stress on the skin increasing the filling of the lymphatic capillaries and thereby stimulating intrinsic contractility.
The idea is that the distribution of the pressure can be relegated and the treatment more targeted, he says.
"The fact that we saw dramatic reductions in both the incidence in rate of infections as well as the decreases in cost-related to care, ER visits, hospitalizations, intravenous antibiotics, is very noteworthy," Rockson concludes.
The research was conducted at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health in collaboration with Vanderbilt University School of Nursing.
Previously: Home health care treatments for lymphedema patients cut costs and improve care; New Stanford registry to track lymphedema in breast cancer patients.
