An honest experience of a deep tissue wound

[RockingDad]

Afternoon all,

Before you read ahead this is not a wound size/severity competition, neither do I wish to trade remarks on how you had a something much worse, shrugged it off and went back to skinning the nearest beast for that nights dinner..... its just my thoughts on something that happened to me and how its made me think about medical preps.

I write this as I nurse a three inch wound after having a couple of dodgy moles removed in surgery, day case under local, left abdomen just below waist height. I've had plenty of nice deep cuts before and stitches on various parts of my body so i'm accustomed to minor wounds. These are my thoughts on sustaining a deep, long wound, I hope someone finds this i of use when thinking about wound and first aid preps.

Even in the controlled environment of theatre I was surprised how much blood literally ran down my side, even with swabbing. Its a strange feeling having warm blood running.

Due to not quite enough local I did feel the bottom cut after it had been made. Cut yourself with a sharp enough object you won't feel it until the damage is done.
I consider myself a fairly tough chap, however once over and back at my bed before discharge I did feel pretty shaky.

Even with deep tissue stitches, standard stitches and steri strips I was still pretty nervous about moving around and accidentally opening the wound. It bled on and off for a day or two and dressings had to be changed and that was with the amount of stitches I had.

I felt pretty vulnerable for the first two or three days afterwards and I wouldn't underestimate how a significant wound could effect you or a family member.

It made me realise I want to add more and bigger woubd dressings, some form of sterile wash, and more steri strips to my current kit I have a pack of ten, 5 small and 5 large and the surgeon used 8 even on top of regular stitches. I will also be adding a couple of mini packsof sealed biscuits. ...that cup of tea and small pack of biscuits made all the difference....my mind was focused on something else.

Back to the hospital for a wound check on Monday. Makes you think a little harder if you needed the care I have received and it wasn't there...not necessarily shtf type things but perhaps remote camping.

Have a good day everyone

Rockingdad

[unsure]

ive often thought about this , after burning my hand at work and needing the dressing changed every day then every 2 days for about 3 weeks it does make you think about the amount of dressing you could get through for any given accident
i currently have 3 large first aid box`s one of which is a tool box size , but i doubt these would last very long in real use other than the usual cuts and scrapes .
ive also been thinking about getting in proper stitch`s . ive been doing a little research and found out the larger the number the smaller the needle , so 4.0 is better to have in than 2.0 , ok i`m no surgeon but you never know if some one you know can do the job . i think if its just a flesh wound you could do it your self .

[sg4]

your are right to be concerned by how much equipment you can go through but we live in a world of excess. surgery has been performed before we had dressing infact sterilisation came about during American civil war when all the south had was cotton so they kept boiling it. dont think their is to much to worry about as people did fine for thousands of years before this. More died from lack of medicine than lack of bandages

[madgaz]

This is one thing that jumped to the forefront of my mind just last year. I knew NO first aid what-so-ever. 7 months down the line from taking my first ever EFAW course, I'm half way through becoming a qualified first aider for St John Ambulance (next week is assessment time)
If you have the kit, you need to know how to use it. Knowledge is power n'all

[24942895]

Add some suture sets as well as steristrips for closing wounds.
For limbs, a couple of wraps of gaffer tape can help keep a wound closed when muscle and other movement can re-open.

Bulk buying dressings are cheap and properly stored I'd trust them way beyond the marked date.

Blood loss and/or pain can send you into shock, when it comes on slowly you have a few minutes to work on yourself before you get to woozy or pass out. There are huge variables in there obviously.

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Tapatalk 2

[Arzosah]

Great post, RockingDad. I had a wound on my upper back that needed 5 stitches on the skin, and two internal stitches ... and yes, I was shocked at the medical input it needed, changing dressings, cleaning (before and after), and how concerned I was about normal movement opening it up again, they'd warned me about it - don't reach forward with both hands, specifically, they said. That was on my right side, and my left side was suffering with an operation for arthritis, so I was really stuffed for a while

Hope you're feeling okay now. Take it slow!

[PreppingPingu]

Just another thought to add - sanitary pads. With me and my daughters in the house I always have a stock, but I reminded my daughter of their first aid use this weekend when she was packing her rucksack for her DoE practice hike and putting together a basic first aid kit. They are very absorbent! So yes they are good for the obvious but can be also useful for a wound that bleeds a lot while you are applying the initial pressure.