Prophylactic NPWT to Reduce SSI in Colorectal Surgery

The purpose of this study is to see if the Negative Pressure Wound Therapy (NPWT) system is effective and safe for the prevention of superficial and deep incisional surgical site infections (SSI) in high risk patients within 30 days after elective colorectal surgery. It has been shown that patients with an IBD, patients undergoing a reoperation or patients with certain comorbidities are at a higher risk of developing an SSI. The NPWT device is a wound dressing with a vacuum system that can be placed over abdominal wounds. The study will include up to 400 patients at this single site, where these high risk patients will be randomized to receive either one of two arms. The first arm involves the placement of the NPWT device in the immediate postoperative period over abdominal wounds after clean/contaminated colorectal surgical procedures. The device would then be left on for 5 days. The second arm would be standard of care and would entail routine postoperative protocols. Subjects will then be seen once at a 30 day (± 7 days) follow-up visit to assess for the development of SSIs.