| Abstract: | The addition of hydrosurgery into our surgical armamentarium will aim to revolutionize surgical wound debridement. Hydrosurgery (Versajet 1 ) utilizes a high pressure fine saline jet delivered via a compact hand‐piece to debride, irrigate and remove debri simultaneously. The hydrosurgery system is minimally invasive enabling debridement at the bedside, with minimal haemorrhage and analgesic requirements 2 . Its applications range from debridement of traumatic and non‐traumatic wounds (acute and chronic), wound lavage, debridement of variable thickness burns, wound bed preparation prior to skin grafting, and flap recontouring. Complex infected wounds (necrotising fasciitis) may also be debrided with potential maximal preservation of adjacent neurovasculature and viable tissues. We present five cases involving the use of the Versajet for the debridement of three diabetic foot wounds, one venous ulcer, and one traumatic chest wound. All hydro‐debridements were performed at the bedside with an average procedure time of 23 minutes (15–40 minutes), an average analgesic requirement of 10 mg morphine (5–15 mg), and with minimal encountered blood losses (including two patients on Coumarin). Only a single ward debridement procedure was required to achieve a healthy wound bed in all five patients. The Versajet enables debridement and wound bed preparation that is efficient, minimally invasive, and cost effective with reductions in hospital stay. |
