to cover a wound or not? - Page 3

Joan, covering it with a light dressing is not going to cause it to close over or prevent drainage. If that's really a concern, it should be packed with saline soaked gauze, anyway, to keep it open. The important thing is it's not stitched...that would have been a real mistake!

In human medicine, treatment for a wound like this would be to cover with an absorbent dressing to keep it clean, and keep the moisture from soiling the patient's clothes, and irrigate with a syringe of normal saline (right into the depths of the wound) once a day. If really deep, it would be packed with saline-soaked ribbon gauze to keep it open and draining. And of course, the dressing would be changed daily or even twice a day, if the wound was draining so much that the dressing was soaked.

Anyway, dogs don't wear clothes, so no need to protect it unless there's excessive licking going on....

 

Thanx all for useful comments. old girl seems fine.

? I have used iodine for years for myself, horse and dogs. same product. both my vet and doctor no longer recommend it and neither use iodine base products.

why do you think they have changed??

Like hydrogen peroxide, iodine destroys healthy new tissue, that's why. I am glad the doctors are FINALLY getting the message! When I was nursing, it was an uphill battle to convince the doctors not to prescribe iodine for use on wounds. Another frequently prescribed treatment was hygeol, which was actually a dilute bleach solution. You can imagine what THAT did to fragile new tissue! 

The pharmeceutical companies did come up with an ointment or paste called Iodosorb that was iodine based, but gentle enough not to kill new granulation tissue. It was expensive, but wow, did it do a good job of helping wounds heal!

Visiting nurses are on the cutting edge of wound care. I was constantly taking seminars to upgrade my skills. One Friday afternoon, when I had a patient with a very badly infected incision from a heart bypass, and managed to get hold of her MD before he took off for the weekend, he said to me, "Look, you obviously know what you are doing, and I don't. Please tell me what I should write for a wound care order for this patient!"

Very few doctors are that honest and humble...   

I still think Betadine soap is a good cleanser to use for fresh wounds that don't expose the deeper tissues. Doctors still use it to clean the patient's skin before surgery, and as a nurse, I used it for cleaning before inserting an I.V. catheter.

SS iodine has been the staple in first aid kits in the bush for decades. most of the ideas have come from early millitary usage.

really that bad? Seems well proven?

Yes, many scientific studies have proven it is harmful to wound healing. About the only thing it's still good for is cleaning skin  before surgery, and keeping dry gangrene (usually diabetic patients) from becoming wet gangrene, as it is very drying to the skin.

There's much better options than iodine for wounds and if you have ever dumped some in an open wound you will know it HURTS, so lose the iodine for something that works better and doesn't hurt.  Cautorizing works great too, but we don't do that anymore for the same reasons.

Well have mostly moved on to chloromide, pink stuff.

i still use iodine on my horsey. but will re think it. tbh i still use iodine products on myself.

Chlorohexidine is a much better option for cleaning wounds, both animal and human. We don't generally go to the vet for wounds anymore... nothing they will do that I can't.  

Melissa

I do some doctoring myself as well, iodine is useful, but I would not choose it here for many of the same reasons Sunsilver brought up.

It's great for external problems but not so much for open wounds.

The first in first aid is just getting the would clean, a sterile saline solution in a squeeze bottle works well just to remove debris from the wound.

I have done my own stitching a time or two using a light monofilament fishing line but i wouldn't recommend that to most people either.

Mostly if it's too serious for the dog to lick and heal it's own wounds then go to the vet.

Cut's to pads are the most common problem I have had over the years and for the most part they will heal on their own if the dog can stay off it's feet for a few days and tend the wound itself.

Glad the old girl seems to be ok.....:)