skin infection along incision line
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ok now i am on the 3rd skin infection that is the size of half of my incision. My incision has been healed for some time my total knee revision was 11-28-16. The surgeon has put my on antibiotic 2 times alread and 1 time in the hospital. The is white stuff coming out of infection. I called the surgeon again today to be seen asap. My sister in law who is a doctor thinks it is cellulitis.
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martinarvelo april99094
Posted
You really have been unlucky! I suppose they have done a culture to discover exactly what the infection is and the proper antibiotic to zap it? Quicker the better I would think! You certainly don't want it travelling inwards towards the new joint. fingers crossed they sort it out soon.
april99094 martinarvelo
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martinarvelo april99094
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urbanremedy april99094
Posted
ANTIBIOTICS
You may be started on antibiotics to treat the surgical wound infection. The length of time you will need to take the antibiotics varies, but will be for at least 1 week . You may be started on IV antibiotics and then changed to pills later. Take all of your antibiotics, even if you feel better.
The pus from your wound may be tested to figure out the best antibiotic. Some wounds are infected with methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureau (MRSA), which is resistant to commonly used antibiotics. A MRSA infection will need a specific antibiotic to treat it.
INVASIVE SURGICAL TREATMENT
Sometimes, your surgeon needs to do a procedure to clean the wound. They can take care of this either in the operating room or in your hospital room. They will:
Open the wound by removing the staples or sutures
Do tests of the skin and tissue in the wound to figure out if there is an infection and what kind of antibiotic medicine would work best
Debride the wound by removing dead or infected tissue in the wound
Rinse the wound with salt water (saline solution)
Drain the pocket of pus (abscess), if present
Pack the wound (if it is a hole) with strips of saline-soaked dressing and a bandage
WOUND CARE
Your surgical wound may need to be cleaned and the dressing changed on a regular basis. You may learn to do this yourself, or nurses may do it for you. If you do this yourself, you will:
Remove the old bandage and packing. You can shower to wet the wound, which allows the bandage to come off more easily.
Clean the wound.
Put in new, clean packing material and put on a new bandage.
To help some surgical wounds heal, you may have a wound VAC (Vacuum Assisted Closure) dressing. It increases blood flow in the wound and helps with healing.
This is a negative pressure (vacuum) dressing.
There is a vacuum pump, a foam piece cut to fit the wound, and a vacuum tube.
A clear dressing is taped on top.
The dressing and the foam piece are changed every 2 to 3 days.
It may take days, weeks, or even months for the wound to be clean, clear of infection, and finally heal.
If the wound does not close by itself, you may need a skin graft or muscle flap surgery to close the wound. If a muscle flap is necessary, the surgeon may take a piece of muscle from your buttocks, shoulder, or upper chest to put over your wound. If you need this, the surgeon will not do this until after the infection has cleared.
april99094 urbanremedy
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irma85119 april99094
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joanna20027 april99094
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I have a similar issue. Four weeks in, I have a wound along my incision that is about two inches that has not healed. There is no infection (no pus, nor pain, nor inflammation) but it's taking a mighty long time to heal. I was sent home after a week post-op and antibiotics but not presribed any to take when discharged. Then two weeks later, when I went in for my followup appointment, they admitted me for observation and pumped two types of antibiotics via IV. On Day 6, they changed to oral antibiotics and had planned a debridement and muscle flap. But when my surgeon took a look at my wound, he discharged me with a week's worth of antibiotics, saying it was healing nicely. I've changed my dressing twice since my discharge on the 7th of this month and there's still a bit of yellowish discharged left on the dressing, along with scabs of dead skin that has shrunk dramatically from the first week the dressing was changed. I don't know what it is but it is worrying me a bit.