Wound care health education

As long as the superficial wounds such as scratches, cuts, and shallow burns that we encounter daily are treated properly, the risk of infection can be reduced to less than 1%, and the probability of scarring is more than 60% lower than using random folk remedies. This is the most practical conclusion drawn from the nearly 10,000 external injuries handled by our outpatient dressing room every year.

To be honest, every week in our dressing room, we encounter about a dozen people who treat their wounds carelessly and get infected, which is really a pity. Last week, a young man who just graduated fell down his knee while riding a shared bicycle to work. There was a lot of bleeding after he went home. He followed his mother's advice and sprinkled Yunnan Baiyao powder on him. He also covered it with two layers of thick Band-Aid for three days. When he arrived, the surrounding skin was red, swollen and hot. , the ooze soaked the medicinal powder until it was sticky, and when cleaning it, he was so painful that he clutched the railing and shook. The small scratch should have healed in three to five days, but he had to change the medicine for two weeks before it healed, and a dark brown mark was left. Now he is asking us how to remove the mark.

Many people may have heard the saying that "wounds need to be left to dry and scab to heal quickly." This is actually not wrong, but the applicable scenarios have long since changed. In the early years when medical resources were scarce and disinfection conditions were poor, dry healing was indeed the best solution to reduce the probability of infection. Even now, if you have to go to a dusty construction site after an injury, or have to hike outdoors for a long time and cannot change dressings in time, dry scabbing can be used. But now we can basically buy clean dressings and disinfectants at home. The mainstream academic community recommends wet healing. The cleaned wound is kept in a moist and sterile environment, and the epidermal cells will crawl about 30% faster than the dry scab. There will be no pain due to the scab pulling on the new tissue, and the probability of scarring is much lower. There is no absolute right or wrong between the two methods. It just depends on which one is suitable for your situation.

When you are first injured, don't rush to find medicine. First, use running water or saline to rinse away any foreign matter such as sand and dust embedded in the wound. If there is small bleeding, press it with clean medical gauze or a lint-free cotton towel for two or three minutes, and it can basically stop it. Don't just pour iodine or alcohol when you come up. Previously, an aunt cut vegetables and cut her fingers, then ran to us while holding the wound. She said that she had poured half a bottle of iodine at home, and she almost fainted from the pain. In fact, for damaged wounds and mucous membranes, iodophor is enough. The irritation is only 1/10 of iodine, and the disinfection effect is not bad at all. The use of red and purple liquids is not recommended for a long time. The pigmentation is deposited in the wounds, and the doctor cannot see whether there is infection even if he wants to check.

How to deal with it after disinfection depends on what you want to do next. If you rest at home and the surrounding environment is clean, just apply a thin layer of Vaseline or medical repair ointment and a thin hydrocolloid dressing. You don’t need to wrap it tightly, and you don’t need to change it every day. As long as the dressing is not soaked or dirty, it is okay to change it every two or three days. If you have to go out, especially to a crowded or dusty place, put a breathable sterile gauze on it to avoid getting dirty. Don't listen to people saying "it needs to be aired to breathe", think about it, fresh granulation tissue is very delicate, it will hurt when the wind dries, and it will also stimulate scar hyperplasia. There was a 7-year-old girl who had a scratch on her face by the nails of her deskmate.

There is also a rumor that has been circulating for decades, saying that you should not eat soy sauce when you are injured, otherwise you will leave black scars. This is really nonsense. The pigment in soy sauce is metabolized by the gastrointestinal tract after being eaten, and cannot reach the skin layer at all. What really makes scars obvious is repeated infection of the wound, picking with hands when the scabs form, and exposure to the sun after the scabs fall off. If you are really worried about leaving scars, waiting for the scabs to fall off naturally and applying more sunscreen will be much more effective than avoiding soy sauce. If you have scars, and there are raised red marks after the scabs fall off, come to the hospital as soon as possible to prescribe scar removal cream or scar softening injections. Don’t blindly apply any ancestral scar removal medicine sold by WeChat merchants on your own, as it is useless and prone to allergies.

Of course, not all wounds can be treated by yourself. If you are pricked by a rusty nail or scratched and bitten by a cat or dog, don't hesitate to come to the hospital for tetanus and rabies vaccination. You really can't leave anything to chance. If the wound is more than 1 centimeter deep, or if the bleeding cannot be stopped after ten minutes of pressure, you have to come over and see if you need to suture it. Don’t just put a band-aid on it, otherwise it will leave a big scar that will be difficult to heal.

In fact, wound care really doesn’t have to be so fancy. Many people mess up the wound after spending a long time because they have listened to too many unfounded folk remedies, such as applying toothpaste, spreading incense ash, and applying unpurified raw aloe vera. It is really better to rinse the wound thoroughly, disinfect it, don’t pick it randomly, and use sun protection. It is worse than anything else. Oh, by the way, someone else asked when can I touch the water? As long as the scabs fall off naturally or 24 hours after the sutures are removed, it's okay to take a shower and wash your hands normally. Just don't soak in the water for a long time. You can't go without taking a shower for half a month just because of a small wound, right? If there are too many bacteria on the surrounding skin, it will make it more susceptible to infection, right?