wound opened

hi everyone.  i had posted last week about my one incision draining a lot.  i went to the surgeon and he decided to reopen part of it to allow it to drain properly.  as a result, i have to have a nurse come to the house daily to pack and change my wound.  the nurse says its a very deep wound and might take about 6 to 8 weeks to heal. 

i am pretty much freaking out since i wanted to go back to work today!!  does anybody have any experience with anything like this?  i go back to the surgeon this wednesday so i'm trying not to freak out too much until i talk to him. 

also the nurse also wants me to remain as still as possible.  she said i will heal faster and try to avoid getting adhesions. 

advice anyone?????

I'm a nurse and I disagree with her completely. You shouldn't remain still, just go about your daily activities and even exercise as you're allowed. You may need to "take it easy" but that's very different from "staying still." Many people have issues with wounds and although they're annoying they will heal with time. The packing allows to fluid to be wicked out of the body and helps prevent it from becoming infected. As your body heals, it will slowly close from the inside out. I know, it sounds gross and is a little hard to think about but it's actually better to allow it to heal this way to ensure you don't develop an infection. Depending on the work you do there really isn't any reason you can't go back. You may need to bring some extra dressing stuff with you in case it drains a lot and you need to change it at the office. Ask the doctor or his nurse to show you how to do that. It's not hard since you will only need to change the outer part of the dressing- not the packing. Feel free to message me if you have any questions I can answer. Please, ask the doctor what your limitations are for activity. Make sure you keep up on your protein, vitamins, water, and eat the best quality foods you can to help your body heal quickly. It's difficult to deal with but it will be over before you know it! Take care!

 I did not have this experience, but just want to also stress the importance of getting all of your protein in.. its really important for healing.

I'm sorry to hear what you are going through right now.

I too experience complications after I thought my incisions were done healing. The doctor left stitches sticking out in two of them and they did not get absorbed with the scar which irritated everything. So now both incisions are infected after 2 weeks and one has an abcess under the scab.

Cloths can irritate the healing so wear loose clothing. Keep it clean and disinfect as much as you can. Wash your hands. Wash your bedding. And if the dressing gets too saturated at work or during the night, try a trick my mom, an RN uses in med/surg. Instead of a gauze pad, cut up a maxi pad. It works great and is SUPER absorbent.

Good luck!

Sorry for your wound issues.  I had a simuliar situation.  I did not know that I was going to have a open wound till 2 weeks before the surgery.  I was so upset I wanted to give up.  Granted I am a nurse and all , I've seen wounds before and had to dress them but I just couln't get with the idea of doing my own wound packing.  For me it was aweful.  Just the thought of oozing and having to perform it myself was the thing for me.  One of my girlfriends had the same surgery done and she did'nt hae an open wound that needed packing , so that also upset me even further.  So what I did was packed it for a week or 2 and after that Ilet it close on it's own. I am not advising that you do the same.  I just figured if we both had the same surgical pprocedure done why should I torture myself, why not let it heal from the inside out like I've seen other wounds do as well.  So needless to say everything healed fine, and I was ok that God because I was surely praying everyday.

After my tummy tuck incision, the WHOLE thing turned necrotic and I had to have all sorts of dead skin and tissue cut out, I ended up with a deep, triangular crater in my belly (that\ was EASILY big enough to place a baseball in) that took over 5 months to completely heal up and regrow the skin. It was so deep that at one point, you could easily see the muscle fascia.

Because we knew it would take MONTHS to heal up, I had to go back to work with the giant wound on my belly, with the wound packed with gauze and then covered over with a large abdominal pad and LOTS of tape to hold it in place.

There is no reason you cannot clean and pack your own wound (it is not hard... just gross, especially if your belly looks like something off a cadaver) and go to work normally with it covered. You will just need to clean and repack it as soon as you get home from work. If the wound is big enough, you can get a wound vac that only has to be replaced every 72 hours (but hgas to be done by a visiting nurse and then you have to carry around a portable vacuum unit).

Lora

Also, being still will not prevent adhesions (and moving around will not cause them)... you will form SOME adhesions there no matter WHAT you do as it heals it.  Being still will just put you at risk for blood clots!

Lora

I am with ****rogirl as I,too, am after TT (really Abdominoplasty) on 8.08 and developed a slough (pronounced sluff) which became gangrene and was admitted on 12.09 to hospital and 2 days later had debridement surgery with 'packing" and then was put on a Woud VAC in hospital--and here I still am!  But i am still in hospital because I live three hours and a half hours away from hospital by bus and I live alone in a hi-rise building. Really my HMO is on the case that I should be at home with Wound VAC , but I have real concerns if the machine goes beeping and i have to do a dressing. My wound is right above the pubic hair. it was 7cmwide and I don't remember its other dimensions, but this morning it was I think, 3 cm.
Mikimi in Israel

my largest incision opened about a week and a half after surgery.  I had to pack it myself :(  it was gross and took quite a while to heal, but it did heal :)  and I was never told not to move around--did not make it worse by moving and doing my normal activities.  good luck :)

  I had a nasty infection in the main incision from my surgery.  I was running a 103 fever and had to have an emergency visit to my dr on sept 19th,( my surgery was on sept 7).  They reopened the incision and cleaned out the infection..  Everyday, twice a day, since then I have been changing the bandage and packing the incision .  The wound has slowly started closing around the edges and healing from the inside out.  Today, my dr. told me I did not have to pack it anymore.  Let it close.  It has been 4 weeks.  I cried when they told me it was going to have to stay open for awhile.  The entire thing was depressing.  I survived and it is healing.  The tape was the worst part of it.  It should not stop you from your normal activities.  The only thing I could not do was go swimming or take a bath.   Good luck with it, it will eventually heal.  Don't stress too much.