Virtual care for chronic wounds in residential aged care settings: a scoping review protocol

JBI Evid Synth. 2025 Nov 10. doi: 10.11124/JBIES-24-00528. Online ahead of print.

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: This scoping review will identify and map the available literature on virtual care for chronic wound management in residential aged care settings.

INTRODUCTION: Chronic wounds are an underacknowledged public health issue with substantial health and economic costs. These wounds, which do not heal in a timely manner, are common in residential aged care settings. While evidence-based wound care is essential for better outcomes, access is challenging in residential aged care settings. Emerging virtual care interventions have improved access to evidence-based wound care; however, little is known about the current use of such interventions in residential aged care settings.

ELIGIBILITY CRITERIA: This review will include adults with chronic wounds living in residential aged care across diverse geographic locations. The review will consider virtual care for chronic wounds, with a particular focus on intervention type and frequency, as well as barriers and enablers of use.

METHODS: The proposed review will be conducted in accordance with the JBI methodology for scoping reviews and reported using the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR). MEDLINE (Ovid), CINAHL (EBSCOhost), Embase (Ovid), AgeLine, IEEE Xplore, and ACM digital library will be searched for relevant literature, with no limitations on language or date of publication. The World Health Organization's International Clinical Trials Registry Platform (WHO ICTRP) and the US National Institutes of Health Ongoing Trials Register will be searched for gray literature. Title, abstract, and full-text screening will be conducted by 2 independent reviewers. Data will be extracted using a reviewer-developed tool, and a narrative summary will accompany the tabulated results.

REVIEW REGISTRATION: OSF https://osf.io/j97bt.

PMID:41215597 | DOI:10.11124/JBIES-24-00528