Wound VAC

Anybody out there ever had a wound VAC?  After my tummy tuck and hernia repair, I developed to areas of necrosis which resulted in two open wounds.  Weekly debridement and 6 1/2 weeks later and I am still not healed.  Dr. is going to reopen those areas, debride all the dead tissue and put on a wound VAC.  If you have had any experience with this, I would love to hear about it.  Many thanks and much appreciation for your time, concern and info.  

I have no experience with wound vac but just wanted to say I hope you heal soon and will say a prayer for you.

Hi!  I did have a wound vac.  The largest of my 5 incisions healed and then started leaking.  Surgeon opened in up in the office and instructed to have it packed once a day by a visiting nurse.  This happened about a week and a half afte rmy surgery which was at the end of September.  This went on and on for all of October and November.  The surgeon kept saying it will heal, but it never did.  Finally at one of the later nursing appointments, the nurse noticed that another hole opened at the top of my incision.  The surgeon decided to cut to make the two incisions into one, in the office with no anesthetic no less.  My wound was then big enough for a wound vac.  It got placed on me on December 11th and came off December 23rd.  I had it for 12 days and it made all the difference in the world.  So yes, I highly reccomend the wound vac!
If you have any other questions, feel free to message me.  Good luck.

As a nurse, I frequently take care of patients who have wound vacs.  They really help with wound healing when all other options have run out.  The ones they use for outpatient treatment are small and disposable.

Yep.  I had lung surgery when I had severe pneumonia to clean the infected fluid out of my left lung, and the incision did not heal properly.  I was on a wound vac for about a week.  It wasn't really a big deal.  It didn't hurt at all.  there was a little tube that sucked out gross bloody looking fluid that collected in a plastic container.  It was all attached to a big pole, like an IV stand kind of thing, and had to be plugged in.  I was in the hospital the whole time so it wasn't like I was moving around much, but it had to be unplugged and the pole wheeled along with me when I went to the bathroom.  It would be more of a pain at home, I think, but more of an annoyance than anything.  I'm guessing you couldn't shower with one, but maybe there is a way to do that.  I wasn't able to get up to shower anyway, I was doing bed baths.

I needed one when my entire tummy tuck incision tunred necrotic, but by the time I saw my RNY surgeon about it (the PS said a wound vac wouldn't significantly speed healing, which I am now prettyv sure is untrue) and she ordered the wound vac and the isnuracne apporved it, I was traveling for work every 2 weeks or so and could not be around to have the nurse come and change the foam, etc. every couple of days so I ended up not getting one.  I had a crater that a grapefruit would have fit in if it had been a little rounder instead of triangular and it was deep -- you could see the muscle fascia in part of it -- and it took over 5 months (of cleaning and repacking twice a day) for it to heal up and the skin to grow back over it.  I have a hard time believing that it would not have healed more quickly with the wound vac!

My insurance would only have covered 60% of the cost of the equipment rental, supplies, and home health care nurse needed (several hundred dollars per week), BTW... so it would have been a lot of money out of pocket if I had been able to use it. 

Lora

I hope you feel better soon, I have not had a wound vac but I understand that they can be effective. My prayers are with you.

These wound vac stories really scare me. Because over a year ago I had fibroid tumors removied, and because they discharged me from the hospital the same day, my bikini line incison opened up in places. The wound had to be packed, and I had to drive to the hospital daily for packing ...by my self. So I took no real pain meds after surgery. 

I know that I will need an abdominalplasty but I really don't want to undergo the packing thing again. The doctor told me that there are multiple factors tha cause the  body to not heal after an incision has been closed including obesity and "tissue type". I think my wound opened because of the obesity part and being made to go home so soon to care for myself. When I had tumors removed in 2000 they kept me for 4 days and I had no wound problems.

After weight loss, obesity will not be a factor but perhaps th "tissue type" thing could be. I can only hope for the best. 

Another contributing factor is the blood supply to the skin to begin with.  That can be compromised  (with no visible symptoms) by previous surgeries in the same general area.  It is also apparently often somewhat compromised on any skin that has stretch marks.  My tummy tuck was my THIRD midline incision surgery, so existing compromised blood supply was likely the primary cause of mine.

Just curious... why did they not just have you clean and repack the wound? It's not like it takes any special training.

Lora

I could not clean or repack the wound because at that time I weighed 314 pounds and most of my weight is carried abdominally. I could not see nor reach  that area safely to pack a wound.  I needed a mirror to see, and I couldnt pack and use the mirror at the same time because I had to hold up the area with both hands.

Thanks.  I get it.  I'm sorry...  if I really had stopped to think more about it, it should have occurred to me that the logistics of that would be difficult.  (I would have had the same problem before losing the weight.)  Please accept my apology for my lack of sensitivity... and be heartened to know that -- one of these days down the line -- those kinds of issues/limitations will just be a memory for you, too!

Lora