Case presentation: We experience a 47-year-old lady who developed an unrecognised EVI after being admitted for sepsis. The EVI turned out to be a huge and sloughy skin ulcer. A series of wound debridement with vacuum dressing were conducted until the wound was able to be closed.
Discussion: The EVI can be categorised according to Amjad EVI grading and Loth and Eversmann's EVI classification. Adult EVI tends to be overlooked, especially during critical care because patients cannot complain upon sedation and ventilation. In order to prevent EVI, firstly prevention is better than cure. Secondly, if EVI is recognised early, infusion should be stopped immediately. Thirdly, analgesia is mandatory. Finally, the plastic team needs to be engaged if it is deemed required.
Conclusion: Prevention and early intervention before the occurrence of progressive tissue damage is the key to treatment. Early radical wound debridement and immediate or delayed wound coverage with skin graft or skin flap are indicated in full thickness skin necrosis, persistent pain, and chronic ulcer.
DESIGN: A systematic review and meta-analysis was performed. The following databases were searched using the keywords ("rebamipide" OR "gastroprotective agent*" OR "mucosta") AND ("dyspepsia" OR "indigestion" OR "gastrointestinal symptoms"): PubMed, Wed of Science, Embase, CINAHL, Cochrane Clinical Trials Register. The primary outcome was dyspepsia or upper GI symptom score improvement. Pooled analysis of the main outcome data were presented as risk ratio (RR) for dichotomous data and standardized mean difference (SMD) for continuous data.
RESULTS: From an initial 248 records, 17 randomised controlled trial (RCT) publications involving 2170 subjects (1224 rebamipide, 946 placebo/control) were included in the final analysis. Twelve RCTs were conducted in subjects with organic dyspepsia (peptic ulcer disease, reflux esophagitis or NSAID-induced gastropathy) and five RCTs were conducted in patients with functional dyspepsia (FD). Overall, dyspepsia symptom improvement was significantly better with rebamipide compared to placebo/control drug (RR 0.77, 95% CI = 0.64-0.93; SMD -0.46, 95% CI = -0.83 to -0.09). Significant symptom improvement was observed both in pooled RR and SMD in subjects with organic dyspepsia (RR 0.72, 95% CI = 0.61-0.86; SMD -0.23, 95% CI = -0.4 to -0.07), while symptom improvement in FD was observed in pooled SMD but not RR (SMD -0.62, 95% CI = -1.16 to -0.08; RR 1.01, 95% CI = 0.71-1.45).
CONCLUSION: Rebamipide is effective in organic dyspepsia and may improve symptoms in functional dyspepsia.