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Exploring Our Range of Wound Care Solutions: Find Your Perfect Match
Most people walk into the dressings aisle and pick whichever box looks closest to what their GP or nurse used last time. For grazes, that's fine. For anything else, the wrong dressing can slow healing for weeks, irritate the surrounding skin, or hide signs of infection.
Modern wound care rests on one principle: wounds heal faster in a moist, balanced environment than under a dry scab. George Winter first published the finding in Nature in 1962, and decades of research have backed it in. Almost every advanced dressing on the market today is built around that idea.
Most wounds heal on their own with sensible cover and a bit of patience. The choices below are about doing the basics right, not about doing more than the wound needs.
Seven wound dressing types cover most clinical and household needs: hydrocolloid for light exudate, transparent film for shallow grazes and IV cover, foam for moderate to heavy exudate, alginate for heavy exudate and bleeding wounds, hydrogel for dry wounds, silver for infected wounds, and broader antimicrobials where silver is not the right tool.
Hydrocolloid dressings
Hydrocolloid dressings are adhesive pads containing gel-forming agents over a waterproof outer film. On contact with wound fluid, the inner layer forms a soft gel that conforms to the wound bed and keeps the area moist.
They suit light to moderately exuding wounds: superficial pressure injuries, shallow ulcers, minor burns past the cooling stage, and small post-procedural wounds. Many can stay in place for three to seven days, which reduces handling and dressing-change discomfort.
I've been nursing over thirty years. The yellow gel and slight smell on a hydrocolloid coming off still puts new staff on edge the first time. It's normal, not a sign of infection. FAD stocks a range of hydrocolloid dressings suitable for home and clinical use.
Transparent film dressings
Films are thin, transparent, adhesive sheets that let air and moisture vapour through while keeping bacteria and liquids out. They are the standard cover for IV sites, shallow grazes that need protection from friction, and surgical incision lines that are already closed.
Common products include Tegaderm and Opsite Post-Op. They can stay in place for several days, but they have no absorbency, so they are not the right choice for any wound producing more than a trickle of fluid.
Foam dressings
Foam dressings combine a polyurethane foam layer with either a plain or silicone-bordered contact surface. They absorb moderate to heavy exudate and cushion the wound from pressure and knocks.
Common indications include pressure injuries, post-surgical wounds, diabetic foot ulcers, and venous leg ulcers. Silicone-bordered options are gentler on fragile or older skin and reduce trauma on removal, which matters in aged-care and home-nursing settings.
Foam needs replacing once the fluid load reaches its capacity, not on a fixed schedule. Browse the foam dressings range for bordered and non-bordered options across common sizes.
Alginate dressings
Alginate dressings are made from calcium and sodium salts of alginic acid, which is derived from brown seaweed. On contact with wound exudate they form a soft gel that fills the wound bed and absorbs heavily.
They're well suited to heavily exuding wounds, cavity wounds, and bleeding wounds. The calcium-sodium exchange that drives gel formation also has a useful haemostatic effect (it helps slow minor bleeding). Alginates need a secondary cover dressing, such as a film or pad, to hold them in place.
They're not the right choice for dry wounds, which need a moisture-donating dressing instead. See the alginate dressings range for standard pads and rope formats.
Hydrogel dressings
Hydrogel dressings are 70 to 90 per cent water suspended in a gel matrix. They donate moisture to dry wound beds, support the body's own cleaning process (autolytic debridement, where the body's own enzymes gradually soften dead tissue), and have a cooling effect that helps with pain.
Use them on dry wounds, wounds with light necrotic tissue, partial-thickness burns once the standard cooling period has passed, and painful wounds where dressing change comfort matters. The clinical rule of thumb is straightforward: if the wound is dry, wet it.
They're not the right choice for heavily exuding wounds. Hydrogel would over-saturate the wound bed and macerate the surrounding skin.
Silver dressings
Silver dressings release ionic silver, which disrupts bacterial cell function across a broad spectrum. They're used on wounds showing clinical signs of infection or critical colonisation (bacterial load high enough to slow healing without showing clear infection signs), not on clean wounds as routine cover.
The international consensus is the two-week challenge protocol. Use a silver dressing for two weeks, then reassess. If the signs of infection have resolved, step back down to a standard dressing. If they have not, the wound usually needs review by a clinician rather than a longer silver course.
Common products include Aquacel Ag, Mepilex Ag, and Acticoat. They differ in delivery method and silver concentration, so the choice often comes down to the wound's exudate level. One specific caution: silver sulfadiazine cream is no longer recommended for fresh burns past the cooling stage, because it can slow re-epithelialisation (new skin growth across the wound). See the silver dressings range for current products.
Antimicrobial dressings (broader)
Silver is one antimicrobial mechanism. Others include iodine (povidone-iodine and cadexomer iodine), PHMB (polyhexamethylene biguanide), and medical-grade Manuka or Leptospermum honey. ARTG-listed honey dressings such as Medihoney are evidence-based for certain wound types. Kitchen honey is not, and should never go on a wound.
These dressings suit wounds at risk of infection but not yet clearly infected, and wounds where silver is contraindicated. The two-week challenge applies across most antimicrobial mechanisms, not just silver.
The choice between mechanisms is generally a clinical decision rather than a consumer one. For wounds outside the simple-graze category, treat antimicrobial selection as a conversation to have with a GP, practice nurse, or wound consultant.
How to choose between wound dressing types
A short decision summary for stocking and selection.
| Wound type | First-line dressing |
|---|---|
| Dry, with necrotic tissue | Hydrogel |
| Shallow graze, IV site, low exudate | Transparent film |
| Light exudate | Hydrocolloid, thin foam |
| Moderate exudate | Foam, hydrocolloid |
| Heavy exudate or bleeding | Alginate, hydrofiber, high-absorbency foam |
| Infected or critically colonised | Silver (with two-week reassessment) |
| At risk of infection, silver not appropriate | Iodine, PHMB, or medical-grade honey |
This is a starting point, not a replacement for clinical judgement. The choice still depends on wound depth, location, exudate pattern over time, the patient's broader health, and whether the wound is part of a chronic condition.
A simple home or small-workplace cupboard does not need every option. Sensible coverage looks like a box of small island dressings for grazes, one or two hydrocolloid pads, one or two foam dressings (silicone-bordered if there is anyone with fragile skin in the house), a few transparent films, saline ampoules or pods for irrigation, and a few rolls of gauze. Antimicrobial dressings should not sit unused in a first aid kit. They're a clinician's call when a specific wound needs one.
When to seek clinical advice
A few situations call for a clinician sooner rather than later:
- A wound has not closed within four weeks despite appropriate care.
- Redness is spreading more than two centimetres beyond the wound edge, the patient develops a fever, or pain increases as the wound matures.
- The patient has diabetes and any wound on the foot.
- The patient is older, on immunosuppressants, or otherwise medically vulnerable.
- The wound is over a joint, tendon, or bone, or it is deep enough that you cannot see the base clearly.
Wounds Australia publishes patient-facing guidance that can help when escalation is unclear. For deeper background on the changes happening in dressing technology, see our piece on recent innovations in wound dressing technology, or the cluster overview at wound care and injury guidance.
A good first aid cupboard does not need every dressing on this list. Three or four well-chosen types, refreshed as they expire, cover most of what most households and small workplaces will ever need.
Not sure which dressing is right for what you have got? Phone us on 03 5443 2239. We've been doing this a long time and we'll sort it. Or browse the wound care range to see what's stocked.