Are All Hospital-Acquired Pressure Injuries Preventable?

Hospital-acquired pressure injuries (HAPIs) sometimes serve as a marker of care quality; however, national organizations, including the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, acknowledge that some HAPIs are unavoidable. The National Pressure Ulcer Advisory Panel defines unavoidable pressure injuries as those that develop even though a patient's pressure injury risk factors are assessed, risk reduction interventions are implemented with outcomes monitored, and intervention approaches are revised when needed. Investigators retrospectively studied 165 critical care or progressive care (i.e., intermediate care) patients with HAPIs to determine the proportion of injuries that were unavoidable and identify factors that distinguish unavoidabl…