Top 10 Countdown: Best of Today's Wound Clinic 2022

Coding, payment, and coverage changes never stop! In her Business Briefs column, Kathleen Schaum, MS, reminded readers that wound/ulcer management professionals must continue to be vigilant about reimbursement changes throughout the year.

Any audit can be stressful but it should not be traumatic. David Charash, DO, CWS, FACEP, FUHM, noted proactive advanced preparation and planning will be your best defense against any audit from a third party.

Nadiv Shapira, MD, and Larry Wagner developed the Lipedema Treatment Network (LTN) as a physician management organization aimed at improving treatment of patients with lipedema. Understanding that lipedema is a painful, devastating disease that often goes undiagnosed or is misdiagnosed, the authors wanted to create a network of vetted and qualified providers.

In a September editorial, Caroline E. Fife, MD, FAAFP, CWS, FUHM, noted it’s a good bet if you see patients with non-healing wounds, you have at least one and maybe several who have pyoderma gangrenosum.

“We Woundologists heal wounds they said could not be healed," noted Stephen “Andy” Rohrer, MSN, RN, APRN, AGACNP-BC, FNP-BC, CWS, in his March editorial. “We preserve limbs they said could not be preserved. We treat patients who thought they could not be helped.”

In the first installment of a new column, James V. Stillerman, MD, CWSP, offered his experience in treating hidradenitis suppurativa, a chronic, relapsing, and debilitating inflammatory condition.

In a September article, Marcia Nusgart, RPh, noted the Alliance of Wound Care Stakeholders told CMS that sweeping proposed changes to the way CTPs are paid for and coded in the physician office will limit patient access.

Because readers have submitted many questions about the diverse types of HCPCS codes recently assigned to cellular- and/or tissue-based products (CTPs) for skin wounds, Kathleen Schaum, MS, addressed the “who?” and “what?” and reviewed the recent HCPCS coding assignments that have created this alphabet soup of CTP codes.

In a Let's Be Frank column, Frank Aviles Jr., PT, CWS, FACCWS, CLT-LANA, ALM, AWCC, DAPWCA, proposed a cheat sheet to focus on key factors related to chronic wounds while addressing findings in a comprehensive approach.

There are many, many practitioners advertising that they offer “hyperbaric oxygen therapy” but as W.T. Workman, BS, MS, CAsP, CHT-Admin, FAsMA, FUHM, noted, they are using equipment that is not cleared for use by the FDA at all, or if cleared for use by the FDA, is only cleared for the treatment of altitude sickness.