Failed surgical incision healed at St. Joseph Hospital Wound Care Center

When Angela Scozzari awoke in the hospital, she was told the surgeon had been unable to close the incision and that she had been left with a large open wound.

The 73-year-old Massapequa Park resident had undergone her second mastectomy just a few weeks prior. Though it seemed to go well overall, her physician noticed she’d developed some necrotic areas around the suture during a follow up visit. This would require another surgery to debride the dead skin and give the healthy skin a chance to properly heal.

However, by the time of that surgery, the necrotic area had spread so much that there wasn’t enough healthy skin following debridement to cover the area, and this left Angela with an open, gaping hole under her arm that probed down into the pectoralis muscle by the ribs. “It was as big as a fist,” Angela described, “it was pretty scary actually.”

It quickly became clear to Angela and her medical team that the wound was not going to close on its own without significant help, so Angela found the Center for Hyperbaric Medicine & Wound Healing at St. Joseph Hospital. And from her first interaction while just setting up her consultation, she knew she’d made the right choice. “They were wonderful,” she exclaimed, “they made me feel very comfortable right away.”

On arriving at the center, Angela met with Dr. Michael Castellano. “We hit it off because we both have dachshunds,” he remembered with a smile. Dr. Castellano devised a treatment plan for her that engaged both hyperbaric oxygen (HBO₂) therapy and advanced wound care treatments. “Most of the time etiology is low oxygen delivery to the skin flaps,” he explained. “Hyperbaric oxygen therapy increases oxygen delivery to the tissues and reduces inflammation.”

HBO₂ therapy is a medical treatment designed to enhance the body’s natural ability to heal. During HBO₂ therapy, the patient breathes 100% pure oxygen while inside a pressurized chamber. The pressure inside this chamber is about two and a half times greater than the normal pressure in the atmosphere. This high-pressure environment allows your blood to carry more oxygen to all parts of your body to repair injured tissue. Treatments generally last for two hours and are required five days a week.

“There’s no pain at all,” Angela explained of the treatment. She passed her time in the chamber watching movies and television shows. “It’s very comfortable.”

And it worked quickly.

“We saw a massive improvement over the course of time that she was being treated,” Dr. Castellano explained. “And we treated her to complete closure; she got a great cosmetic result as far as the incision goes,” which he credits to his exemplary staff. “The team here really cares about the patients, and that makes a difference. It’s not all about shuffling the patients in and out. We get to know the patients and it becomes a place where they can feel comfortable.”

After thirty-five treatments, Angela was released from therapy and even got to enjoy a beach vacation in Florida recently. “They gave me back my life,” she said. “They’re committed professionals who were very careful, everything was very safe. It just worked perfectly, and I would encourage anyone who had this kind of wound to come here and nowhere else.”