Normal wound healing proceeds through a sequence of steps involving the control of contamination and infection, control of inflammation, regeneration of the connective tissue matrix, angiogenesis, and resurfacing. These steps are critically dependent upon adequate oxygen availability and perfusion. When these processes are interrupted Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy (HBOT) is highly important to assist in healing devitalized tissue, controlling infections, and assisting in collagen reproduction and angiogenesis (regenerating blood supply). This is usually an adjunctive therapy to enhance antibiotics and possible surgical interventions.

Optimizing wound perfusion and providing supplemental O2 in the peri-operative period reduces the incidence of postoperative infections. Correction of wound pO2 may, by itself, trigger some healing responses. The goal of HBOT is to create a greater oxygen concentration in hypoxic tissue (lack of oxygen) by breathing larger doses of oxygen at greater than normal
atmospheric pressure increasing oxygen concentrations (partial pressures in blood plasmas) upwards of 1000%. (The greater the pressure, the greater the O2 concentration.)