Global prevalence of chronic wounds has been estimated to be between 0.18 % and 1.3 % in the adult population and 3.6 % in people older than 65 years, increasing to over 5 % for those over 80 years of age. Annually chronic wounds affect approximately 40 million people worldwide. In addition, traumatic wounds (including burns) occur at a rate of 100 million per year and approximately 300 million people suffer from other acute wounds (such as surgical wounds).

This has an enormous impact on health care budgets and quality of life. Following are some examples (source: https://www.healogics.com/);

•  Chronic wounds alone is estimated to have a US 50 billion dollar impact on the US health care system annually.
•  60,000 people die from bedsore-related complications in the US each year.
•  The relative 5-year mortality rate after limb amputation is 68%, which is higher than the relative 5-year
  mortality rate for breast cancer, prostate cancer and colon cancer. That means that you have a better chance
  of living five years if you have breast cancer than if you are diabetic with an amputation for a diabetic foot ulcer.