Moist dressings in the treatment of pressure injuries: A network meta-analysis

AIMS: The aim of this network meta-analysis is to analyze the difference in therapeutic effects between moist dressings and traditional dressings in the treatment of pressure injury (PI), explore the healing, healing time, direct cost, and number of dressing changes of different moist dressings for the management of pressure injuries. BACKGROUND: The incidence of pressure injury is high and the burden of disease is high, but there is no consensus on how to choose moist dressing treatment. DESIGN: A systematic review with network meta-analysis was performed. DATA SOURCES: We searched the Chinese Biomedicine Literature Database and China National Knowledge Infrastructure, Wanfang Database, VIP database, PubMed, Web of Science, EMBASE.com, CENTRAL (Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials) and CINAHL to obtain randomized controlled trials (RCTs) on the treatment of PI with moist dressings. REVIEW METHODS: R studio software and Stata 16.0 software were used to compare different moist dressings and traditional dressings. RESULTS: 41 RCTs of moist dressings in the treatment of PI were included. A total of seven kinds of moist dressings, Vaseline gauze and traditional gauze dressing were involved. All RCTs were at a medium to high risk of bias. Overall, moist dressings had more advantages than traditional dressings in terms of various outcome indicators. CONCLUSION: The effect of moist dressings in treating PI is more advantageous than traditional dressings. However, in terms of direct cost and the number of dressings changes, more research is needed to improve the credibility of the network meta-analysis. The results of the network meta-analysis show that the silver ion dressing and alginate dressing are the best choices in the treatment of PI. NO PATIENT OR PUBLIC CONTRIBUTION: This study is a network meta-analysis, which does not require the participation of patients and the public.