Compliance with science: benefits of developing community leg clubs.

As a district nurse providing leg ulcer management in a rural community, the author was aware that the effectiveness of compression therapy was, in many cases, compromised by poor compliance to treatment. Once the author had researched the underlying causes of non-compliance, she addressed the issues by developing innovative leg ulcer clinics ('Leg Clubs') to provide holistic care in an environment of patient empowerment, destigmatization and peer support. Analysis of data acquired over an 11-month period illustrates that this new approach has yielded significant reductions in the incidence of non-compliance, allowing the benefits of compression therapy to be realized.