Most families meet home wound care in one of three ways: a surgical incision after discharge, a diabetic foot ulcer, or a bedsore on a parent who has been in bed too long. The nursing task is the same in outline and very different in detail, and the cost is driven by frequency, not by the per-visit rate.
What a dressing visit involves
The nurse removes the old dressing, inspects the wound and notes size, depth, colour, discharge and smell, cleans it with saline or the prescribed antiseptic, applies the prescribed dressing, and records what they saw. A competent nurse also checks the surrounding skin, asks about pain and fever, and tells you plainly if the wound is going the wrong way. The visit takes 20 to 40 minutes.
What the nurse does not do is change the treatment. The type of dressing, the frequency and any antibiotics come from the surgeon or physician. If a nurse suggests switching to a different dressing, that goes back to the doctor.
How often
Frequency is set by the wound, and the doctor's instruction on the discharge sheet overrides anything here.
A clean post-surgical incision is usually dressed daily for the first week, then on alternate days until the sutures or staples come out. A diabetic foot ulcer is often daily, sometimes for weeks, because infection risk is high. A pressure sore is typically alternate days once it is clean, with the real work being the two-hourly turning between visits that stops it getting worse. A chronic venous ulcer may need two or three visits a week for months.
What it costs in Bangalore
Bangalore home-nursing providers publicly list wound dressing at about ₹500 to ₹1,000 per nurse visit as of September 2026. Dressing materials are almost always billed separately at actual cost, which is where bills surprise families. Gauze, saline and a basic antiseptic add ₹50 to ₹150 a visit. Advanced dressings prescribed for diabetic ulcers or deep pressure sores, such as foam, hydrocolloid, silver or negative-pressure systems, can cost more per change than the nursing visit itself.
So the monthly picture looks like this. Daily dressing for a month runs ₹15,000 to ₹30,000 for the nurse before materials. Alternate days is ₹7,500 to ₹15,000. Two or three visits a week is ₹4,000 to ₹12,000. Night or early-morning visits and outer-suburb addresses carry a premium.
What changes the price
The wound type and the dressing prescribed matter most. A visit that is a saline clean and gauze is at the bottom of the range; a visit with a vacuum dressing change is at the top and takes longer. Distance is second, especially for daily visits, because the nurse's travel time is the largest hidden cost. A course booked for a fortnight is usually cheaper per visit than single call-outs.
Warning signs that need a doctor, not the next visit
Spreading redness, increasing pain, a bad smell, thick yellow or green discharge, fever, or a wound edge that is turning dark. A good nurse will flag these and call the doctor from your living room. If the nurse does not, you should.
Wound care versus a live-in attendant
For a bedsore, the nurse visit is the smaller half of the job. Bedsores heal only when pressure is relieved, which means two-hourly turning around the clock, a good mattress, and skin kept clean and dry. That is attendant work, not nursing, and it is what a live-in caretaker does between the nurse's visits. If the sore is not improving in two weeks despite dressing visits, the turning schedule is usually the problem.
Before the first visit
Keep the discharge summary and the prescription for the dressing type to hand. Ask for the material to be itemised on the bill. Take a phone photo of the wound at each change so the doctor can see the trend at the next appointment. Confirm the nurse's registration and, for a diabetic wound, that they have handled ulcers before.
EzyHelpers arranges wound dressing at home in Bangalore by registered nurses, per visit or as a course, and quotes once we know the wound and the schedule the doctor has set.