It's no surprise that government officials' eyebrows often arch at the costs associated with providing home care services. Just treating a single pressure sore can add up to more than $50,000, for instance. In the past, technology designed to prevent or treat wounds sometimes added to the problem by making products more expensive and complicated.

Things have changed. Today's technology is sparking wound care products that are both easy to use and cost effective, manufacturers say.

"The focus of creating wound care products is away from all of the bells and whistles, to more efficient, cost-effective, less complicated products that perform the function for which they were designed," says Brian James, president of James Consolidated, a Walnut Creek, Calif.-based manufacturer of support surfaces.

Jamie Orr agrees. "It is no longer a feature-driven product offering that the market needs, but rather an outcomes-focused product system," says Orr, general manager of Laguna Hills, Calif.-based Zephyr Therapeutics.

The technology that once made some wound care products difficult to use has been refined, James says. For example, pressure mattress systems once had very elaborate control units with numerous gauges, but now the category is much simpler. "We make our pressure-sore-prevention products as automatic as possible. Just plug them in, and they are ready for the patient."

Advancements in the manufacture of wound care dressings have made it possible to deliver active agents through the dressing as opposed to taking off a standard dressing, applying agents and replacing the bandages, says Mark Smith, national sales manager for Portland, Ore.-based AcryMed. "A broad spectrum of active agents, both antibiotics and drugs, can be delivered in a time-released fashion through dressings," he says.

"Professional wound care is comprised of a series of technologies that address a wide cross-section of consumer needs, many of them focused on delivering a moist environment that helps the healing process," says Shirley Kolar, sales and marketing information manager for Spenco Medical, Waco, Texas. "The largest growth area in first aid is moist wound dressings."

Following is a selection of wound care treatment and prevention products.