Background: Chronic leg ulcers (CLUs) pose serious public health concerns worldwide. They mainly affect the\nelderly population. Pinch grafting (PG) could be used to treat a variety of CLUs. However, in Cameroon, there is\nscarce data on the outcome of PG of CLUs in elderly patients in rural hospitals where most of these patients seek\nfor medical attention and where clinicians rely on unconventional wound dressing methods to treat CLUs. Our\nobjective was to describe the outcome of PG of CLUs in elderly patients in rural Cameroon.\nMethods: This was a prospective study conducted in a rural hospital of North West Cameroon. From February\n2015 to January 2016, comprehensive historical and clinical data were collected per elderly patient who presented\nwith a chronic leg ulcer necessitating PG. PG was done using a simple procedure and each patient followed up for\n8 months. Outcome was described in terms of ulcer healing and pain and donor site complications.\nResults: Our series included 13 patients: 8 males (61.54%; 95% CI: 31.58ââ?¬â??86.14) and 5 females (38.46%; 95%\nCI: 13.86ââ?¬â??68.42) aged from 69 to 88 years (mean: 77.54 Ã?± 5.70 years). Three patients (23.08%; 95% CI: 5.04ââ?¬â??53.\n81) had associated co-morbidities. All the ulcers were unilateral with durations ranging from 7 to 41 months\n(mean: 19.46 Ã?± 11.03 months). The ulcers ranged in size from 9.0 to 38.1 cm2 (mean: 17.66 Ã?± 8.35 cm 2). We\nregistered one (7.69%; 95% CI: 0.19ââ?¬â??36.03) graft rejection. Concerning the other ulcers, ten (83.33%; 95% CI:\n51.59ââ?¬â??97.91) had healed after 12 postoperative weeks while 2 (16.67%; 95% CI: 2.09%ââ?¬â??48.41) had healed after\n14 postoperative weeks and the mean healing time was 12.33 Ã?± 0.78 weeks. Patients with healed ulcers had\nreduced ulcer site pain from the immediate postoperative period but there was no significant difference in\nthe mean pain scores before and after graft (6.77 against 4.23, p = 0.13). These ulcers remained healed after\n8 postoperative months. Each donor site had healed 2 weeks after PG. Donor site problems were minimal\nand included hypo pigmentation.\nConclusion: The outcome of PG of CLUs in our series of older patients was satisfactory. This finding does\nnot discount the role of conservative therapy, but we encourage clinicians in rural Cameroon to consider\nPG over long-term unconventional conservative therapy in the elderly.
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