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Background: Surgical site infections (SSIs) are frequent postoperative complications that prolong hospital stays, increase pain, and retard recovery. Negative Pressure Wound Therapy (NPWT), which applies controlled suction to the wound bed, may accelerate healing, yet conventional saline-gauze dressings remain widely used. This study compared the effectiveness of NPWT with standard dressings for managing SSIs in a real-world tertiary-care setting.

Methods: Over 18 months, we conducted a prospective study at Katihar Medical College involving 100 patients with SSIs. Participants were randomly assigned to NPWT or conventional saline-gauze dressings. We recorded time to wound closure, length of hospital stay, number of dressing changes, pain scores, and complication rates.

Results: Wounds treated with NPWT closed in a mean of 12 days, significantly faster than the 18 days observed with standard dressings (p < 0.05). NPWT also required fewer dressing changes, resulted in lower pain scores, and shortened hospitalization. Importantly, complication rates were comparable between the two groups, indicating that NPWT did not introduce additional risk.

Conclusions: NPWT outperformed conventional dressings in managing SSIs, leading to faster healing, fewer dressing changes, and shorter hospital stays without increasing complications. Routine adoption of NPWT could substantially improve postoperative wound care.