Both the time prior to and the time after a surgery are clinically important. Before a medical operation, you are to prepare your best body and mental states. After the surgery, you are to recover your stamina and health and to be ready to work on your post-operative wound. Depending on your kind of operation, the wound might either be small or wide, shallow or deeper. It will be very important for you to observe this wound to avoid possible infection. When caring for your surgical wound or incision at home you have to be cautious of several things in order to get proper healing process.
How do I care for surgery wound at home?
Right after you come back home post-surgery, you might be still carrying your incision. Incision is the post-operative wound that you got from certain medical procedure. It is important to care for this incision so that it won’t cause infection which can get your back to the hospital. Post-operative wound care can be done at home with paying special attention to some procedures.
- Wear loose clothes that do not rub over your wound as it may cause the wound to re-open.
- If you have your incision opened, go see your doctor immediately. If your doctor does not stitch it back, you can grab wound dressing bandage to absorb the fluid and keep it covered to get speed up healing.
- Before change your wound dressing or bandage, always wash your hand thoroughly. This is a very important step to avoid bacterial contamination to your wound.
- If your nurse advises you to change the dressing by yourself at home, ask thoroughly about how often the procedure need to be done. When change the dressing, do it gently with clean hands or disposable gloves. Always loose the dressing carefully and wet it if it gets stuck on the wound, unless the doctor advises you to keep your wound dry. Your old dressing should be disposed immediately in a sanitary bag.
- If needed and possible, remove dried blood and fluid around the wound carefully with salt water or mild soap water.
- Put a new dressing and keep your wound covered and moist.
How do I know if the wound is infected?
Sometime, some factors can lead your wound to infection. Handling it with unsterilized hands is the easiest example. It is also possible that your wound is infected by mishandling during healing process. You should see your doctor immediately should you see some signs of infection, such as:
- Your wound has more redness and sore. It is actually normal for your wound and the skin around it to seem red during healing process. This is caused by increasing blood flood sent to your wounded skin to speed up the healing process. However, more redness accompanied by soreness might be a sign of infection.
- Your wound is swelling and filled with fluids. When your wound is swelling, it might be caused by abnormal tissue growth. Fluids collection beneath the wound can also be a sign of infection as those might be the pus.
- Your wound is bleeding. Bleeding is caused by tissues and vessel pressures beneath the wound.
- Your wound gets larger or wider. This is the sign that the wound has infected the surrounding area. This can be caused by bacterial intervention and has to be handles properly.
- The wound dries up, hardened, and thickened. This may be caused by air exposure on your wound. This might limit your mobility and might be a sign of infection.
- Your wound produce certain bad smell. This abnormal smell can also be a sign of bacterial infection on your wound.
- You have got fever. Fever is a sign of internal infection. Should your temperature raises up to 40 °C or 100 °F quickly, you have to be cautious as it may be the way your body tells you about possible infection.
When you notice some signs of infection, go see your doctor immediately to get proper helps. Internal medication might be needed should your wound develop severe infection.