The Sessing Scale for Pressure Ulcer Healing

Description

The Sessing Scale can be used to evaluate a pressure ulcer. Changes in the stage of an ulcer over time can help monitor the response of the ulcer to interventions. The authors are from the University of Southern California Medical Center in Los Angeles and the Sepulveda VA Medical Center.

Skin	Other Features	Stage
normal	at risk	0
completely closed	may lack pigmentation or may be reddened	1
wound, with edges and center filled in	surrounding skin intact and not reddened	2
wound bed filling with pink granulation tissue	slough present (? scab) no necrotic tissue drainage minimal odor minimal	3
moderate to minimal granulation tissue	slough present (? scab) necrotic tissue minimal drainage moderate odor moderate	4
wound with necrotic tissue and/or eschar	drainage heavy odor marked surrounding skin red or discolored	5
wound with necrotic tissue and/or eschar	drainage purulent odor foul surrounding skin with breaks may be septic	6

scale score =

= (previous stage) – (current stage)

Interpretation:

• minimum score: -6

• maximum score: +6

• The higher the score, the better the status of the pressure ulcer.

Scale Score	Interpretation
negative	worsening
0	unchanged
positive	improvement

Performance:

• Simple and easy to use.

• Test-retest reliability: kappa statistic 0.84 (good).

• Correlation with Shea scale: Spearman r = 0.90.

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Description

Specialty

ICD-10