News
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March 12, 2010
MEDIA CONTACT: Joyce Brennan
Public Information Officer
Southcoast Health System
Phone: 508-961-5270
Fax: 508-961-5876
Pager: 508-387-9605
brennanj@southcoast.org
www.southcoast.org/news/releases/
Southcoast announces opening of new wound care center
Southcoast Wound Care Center is the first in the region to offer hyperbaric oxygen
treatment
FALL RIVER, Mass. — Southcoast Hospitals today announced its new Wound Care
Center in Fall River, which will house the first hyperbaric oxygen treatment chambers in the
South Coast region and East Bay R.I., will open on March 15.
“The Southcoast Wound Care Center is an important component to the comprehensive
services being offered through Southcoast Hospitals,” said Keith A. Hovan, President & CEO of
Southcoast Hospitals Group. “Patients suffering with chronic wounds will no longer have to leave
the region for treatment. Our new Wound Care Center offers the most up-to-date approaches to
wound healing and prevention including hyperbaric oxygen therapy.”
The Southcoast Wound Care Center will provide outpatient wound care services,
including circulatory system diagnostics and treatment, nutrition, wound pain management,
diabetes care and hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT), in collaboration with Diversified Clinical
Services, the world’s largest wound care management company.
“Associated with inadequate circulation, vascular insufficiency, obesity and immobility,
non-healing wounds occur most frequently in the elderly and in people with diabetes," said
Gerald Monchik, MD, the center’s Medical Director and a surgeon at Charlton Memorial
Hospital who is also a founding member of Truesdale Surgical Associates. “Studies have shown
that specialized wound care and hyperbaric oxygen therapy accelerates wound healing, reduces
amputation rates and helps patients avoid hospitalization.”
Comprehensive wound care centers treat wound problems with a variety of clinical
treatments, including the removal of damaged tissue (a technique known as debridement),
medicines, dressings and a wide range of support services.
The new Southcoast Wound Care Center has two hyperbaric oxygen chambers that are
designed to deliver high doses of healing oxygen directly to help improve difficult wounds.
Hyperbaric oxygen therapy, also known as HBOT, enriches the patient’s bloodstream with
oxygen to accelerate the wound-healing process. It is estimated that 12 percent of non-healing
wounds benefit from HBOT. An average treatment session is two hours and typically patients
undergo about 30 sessions.
Nationally, more than 7 million Americans suffer from chronic wounds, and this number
is expected to double in the next decade. According to American Diabetes Association statistics,
the South Coast region has a high incidence of diabetes, a contributing factor in the increase in
chronic wounds. Approximately 9 percent of the populations in the Greater Fall River and New
Bedford regions and 8 percent of the Wareham population are diabetic compared with the
national average of 7 percent.
The Southcoast Wound Care Center in Fall River is located at Charlton Memorial
Hospital, 363 Highland Avenue, Fall River. The center will be open from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.,
Mondays through Fridays. To make an appointment, please call 1-800-276-0103 and for more
information please call 508-679-7447 or visit www.southcoast.org/woundcare/.
About Southcoast Health System & Southcoast Hospitals Group
Southcoast Health System is a community based health delivery system with multiple
access points, offering an integrated continuum of health services throughout Southeastern
Massachusetts and East Bay, Rhode Island. It includes the three hospitals that make up
Southcoast Hospitals Group — Charlton Memorial Hospital in Fall River, St. Luke’s Hospital in
New Bedford and Tobey Hospital in Wareham.
Southcoast provides advanced clinical services, such as open heart surgery, angioplasty
and heart rhythm services, comprehensive cancer care, neurosurgery, weight loss surgery,
orthopedic surgery and advanced imaging services and is the only provider of maternity services
in the region. Southcoast is a not-for-profit charitable organization that depends on the support of
the community to provide services.
More information is available online at www.southcoast.org.
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