Linda Benskin

Linda Benskin, PhD, RN, became a wound expert during five years caring for patients and teaching village health workers in a conflict-prone area of West Africa. Since then, she has managed wound patients in person in the USA, and, remotely, worldwide. Dr. Benskin has taught informally and in academic settings, for continuing education credits at educational conferences, in small groups, in webinars, in hospitals, and in remote areas under mango trees, with audiences ranging from experienced surgeons to barely-literate villagers, across six continents.

Benskin’s research and career goal is to improve the effectiveness and decrease the cost of health care, particularly wound management, throughout all care settings. She accepted her current position with Ferris Mfg. Corp. as their Clinical Research, Education, & Charity Liaison because her experience with their dressings has led her to believe that they are the best wound management products available, and she is frustrated that so few patients are able to benefit from them.

Dr. Benskin’s 2012 usual practice study laid the groundwork for her current independent research developing a sustainable method for village health workers in remote and conflict areas of tropical developing countries to manage wounds. Her husband of 45 years, Richard Benskin, is her research associate and technical specialist. A Wound Healing Foundation Clinical Research Grant helped fund their 2021 randomized controlled trial which found that their proposed Available Technology Dressing method for remote and conflict areas of tropical developing countries is safe, effective, and acceptable on sickle cell leg ulcers in Jamaica. The technique has also been used successfully in other challenging settings with other wound types, including a large infected third degree burn in rural Angola.

Dr. Benskin has accepted invitations to peer-review articles for over a dozen academic journals, including Advances in Wound Care and Advances in Skin and Wound Care. Her 2020 Basic Review of the role of vitamin D deficiency in the Covid-19 pandemic has been cited by over 130 author groups and is the anchor document at http://vitaminDforAll.org. Her 2021 peer-reviewed invited chapter on this topic was featured on several DarkHorse podcasts. Her other MEDLINE-indexed publications are specific to wound management and village health worker programs.