loading… Skin characteristics of people with diabetes are different from people without diabetes, and this changing skin condition could be an important characteristic in relation to diabetic foot ulceration. However, due to ongoing discussions as to the nature of the changes and the lack of possibilities to use knowledge on skin characteristics in ulcer prevention…

loading… New research using data from a large UK database has confirmed the association between diabetic foot ulcers and an increased risk of death. Mortality rates of patients with a newly onset diabetic foot ulcer was 8% after 12 months, and 42% after five years. These rates were much higher than for people with diabetes…

loading… A few months ago we discussed a paper by Pete Lazzarini and colleagues showing a greater inpatient burden of foot disease in Australian hospitals. A second article has now been published using this massive dataset, to further investigate how many inpatients have foot disease present and what factors are they linked with. This article…

loading… Despite recommendations in (inter)national guidelines to use knee-high non-removable casts to offload diabetic foot ulcers, felt-padding is still widely used in daily clinical practice. The offloading effectiveness of this felt has hardly been studied, creating a clinically relevant gap in the literature. Researchers from LaTrobe University and Northern Health, both in Melbourne, have now…

loading… New Australian research from Mal Fernando and colleagues has again shown the importance of offloading the high plantar pressures found in people with diabetic foot ulcers. The Queensland based researchers measured plantar pressures in 21 persons with diabetic foot ulcers, and compared these with 69 diabetes and 56 healthy controls. When adjusted for a…

loading… Despite years of research, the cause of Charcot foot remains poorly understood. A relation between neuropathy and bone density has been suggested as possible explanation. New Australian research investigated the assertion that dense peripheral diabetic polyneuropathy is associated with osteopenia of foot bones. In a cross-sectional case-control design, the investigators from the University of…

loading… Both neuropathy and microvascular complications are major contributors to poor outcomes of diabetic foot disease. The interplay between this neural and microvascular dysfunction in diabetes is elaborate, but poorly understood. A new Australian study observed relationships between clinically apparent peripheral sensory neuropathy, cardiac autonomic function and microvascular reactivity (post-occlusive reactive hyperaemia). They found evidence…

loading… New research from Germany studied the progression of diabetic foot disease and the influence of relevant risk factors on disease progression. They found that patients with a first ulcer and patients with reulceration but without any previous amputation had a similar probability of healing without amputation. Patients with PAD had a 10-fold increased risk…

loading… Investing in evidence-based care for Australians with diabetic foot ulcers will cost more money in the short-term but save $2.7 billion over five years for Australia according to a new article published in the International Wound Journal. Health economic and diabetic foot researchers from the Queensland University of Technology (QUT) and the Wound CRC…

loading… New research has been published showing an improvement of Australian rural and remote practitioners’ knowledge of diabetic foot disease. Doctoral candidate Schoen and colleagues from the University of Western Australia investigated differences in a diabetic foot knowledge test before and after an educational session. A total of 246 multidisciplinary health care professionals working in…