How to treat a wound after a burn

At home, it is permissible to treat only mild thermal burns of the first degree. More serious ones require a consultation with a doctor or hospitalization.

Burns are divided into chemical, thermal and radiation, their treatment is fundamentally different. The first are more dangerous and healing goes worse. Having received an acid or alkaline burn, at home you can provide only first aid, immediately dial 112 or 03.

Radiation burns (by current, radiation, etc.) are dangerous by the depth of penetration and exposure to the nervous system, heart and other organs. Electric shock does not always require hospitalization - the lungs slightly sting fingers.

Degree of burn:

• I - pain and redness, possibly a small swelling;
• II - severe pain, redness around the perimeter, blister;
• III - the pain is not felt, because the nerve endings are damaged, and the frequent bleeding. This is a real wound, it can only be treated in a hospital. After most often, cosmetic surgery is required.

Today, doctors do not emit a burn degree IV. It corresponds to carbonization, such a site cannot be treated.

First of all
The first thing to do in case of any burn is to stop the damaging factor: turn off the current or pull a person away from the zone of his sprawl, pull your hand away from a chemical, hot object or hot water.

Help with a thermal burn

Most often in everyday life, people are faced with this particular type of burn. High temperature damages the skin to one depth or another. Sometimes the burn is serious, although its area is small. For example, if a child burns a finger with an iron edge, a narrow strip goes deep into the finger and requires treatment.

Burns with boiling water are the most dangerous: they are almost always extensive (especially if the baby is burned 1 year old), and the cloth of the clothes still accumulates heat and increases damage.

First aid:

1. Take off your clothes quickly. If it is stuck - cut and remove all non-adherent parts (do not try to regret even the most expensive fabric!)
2. Assess the degree of damage to the eye. Instantly appearing blisters or outgoing skin - immediately call an ambulance (if we are talking about a small child). If the damage area is small and the age is middle classes or older, you can act at home, although it is better to go to the emergency room or hospital.
3. Cool the burn site. Some doctors recommend a weak stream of cold water for 10-15 minutes. Others categorically disapprove of this and allow only dry cold: any soft and elastic product from the refrigerator, wrapped in clean gauze or cloth, so as not to deposit dirt on defenseless skin.
4. Even if hot tar, asphalt or the like adhered to the skin, you must first cool the wound (if it is not extensive). It's the most important. Subsequently, mineral or vegetable oil is used to soften and remove plaques.

Important
Do not open blisters. This procedure is prescribed only by a doctor. As a rule, the bubbles burst themselves. In the future, you only need to make sure that they do not get the infection.

Treatment:

1. A slight burn, when the skin just turns red, in fact, does not need treatment and passes in a couple of days. But this place worries, hurts. If a child is injured, he will cry and try to comb the burn. Therefore, it makes sense to use a gel, gel patch or foam with an anesthetic effect. Foams with panthenol and sea buckthorn, among other things, disinfect and accelerate healing.
2. Bursting the bubble and the edges of the area where the skin got off, will have to be treated with antiseptics.But! No tight dressings - the burn should “breathe” for as long as possible, otherwise the wound will get wet, an ugly scar-spot will form, and regeneration will go very poorly. The dressing is needed light - on the street or at school, especially if the wound on the leg.
3. If a crust forms during a burn of the 2nd degree, it does not need to be removed. Treat with sea buckthorn oil or foam with panthenol.
4. Third-degree burns are treated only in a hospital. Constant dressing, antiseptics, anesthesia are required, with extensive burns - detoxification.

From personal experience
When my one-year-old daughter knocked over a mug of tea, she did not have a blister. I hoped it cost 1 degree (I did not know that it was almost cool boiling water). But when I tried to lubricate the painkillers, the girl’s skin got off under my fingers. Never smear a fresh burn!

It’s hard for me to convey my horror at that moment - mothers will understand me. All that was left for me was to fan the place of the burn in order to cool and soothe the pain and comfort the child. At the hospital, the doctor said: it's okay. All we did was treat the place of the burn with sea buckthorn oil.

The girl did not form crusts, the wound healed well. After discharge, the doctor prescribed a baby cream to improve regeneration, so that the whitish spot disappears faster. However, I do not regret that we were hospitalized. The clean conditions of the room and the ability to fully switch to a child, without worrying about cooking and cleaning, made it easy for us to survive an injury and not cause an infection.

Help with a chemical burn

The situation is much worse with a chemical burn: quicklime, concentrated alkali or acid, diesel fuel, gasoline, and the juice of some poisonous plants.

First aid:

1. For most chemical burns, including from ammonia: remove the remaining powder, and immediately rinse the liquid with plenty of plenty of cold water (up to 40 minutes in duration). Running water is preferred; the stream should be wide, but medium or weak in pressure.
2. If a burn from quicklime, aluminum compounds, concentrated sulfuric acid or the same alkali, you can not immediately rinse! First, remove the residues in a dry way, for example, get wet (without pressing your fingers) with dry gauze in several layers. Then rinse thoroughly. It is allowed to treat with oil, but it is better to entrust disinfection to doctors.

In case of eye burns, the chemical residues can be removed by briefly applying a gauze bandage. Then - thoroughly rinse your eyes with clean water and be sure to immediately deliver to the ophthalmology department of the hospital or at least to the on-line optometrist in the clinic.

No need to make an appointment - this is an urgent case, you will be accepted out of turn. If the poison splashed into your face, it is better to play it safe and rinse your eyes. In mild cases, it will be enough for two or three days to make compresses with yesterday's strong brewing of black tea or drip regenerative drops.

Important
Doctors do not allow antidotes to be applied in case of burns by plant sap or neutralizing substances in case of alkali / acid injury. If you have a chemical burn, you must consult a doctor (in an injury or medical center, in the emergency room of the burn department or by calling an ambulance).

Treatment:

1. Chemical burns often heal worse than thermal ones. However, weak and small-area injuries do not require a special approach. Enhancing or even baby cream is enough to help the skin recover.
2. If the damage is deep, antiseptic treatment and light dressing are required, but in general the skin and the injured area should breathe.
3. Third degree wounds need hospital treatment.

From personal experience
Recently put roller blinds. Their frame is attached to a good double-sided tape, and it was necessary to degrease the frame. By the shortsightedness, she took up the procedure without gloves, and very soon the fingers that held the cotton pads turned white - a slight chemical burn. Before it’s too late, I smeared it with a healing cream (we have BoroPlus, my parents prefer the Rescuer) and put on gloves.Fingers had to be softened three or four times before the skin recovered.

In case of electric shock

These lesions relate to radiation and their main danger is that they pass through the whole body. Even if there are no local marks, the damage can be significant. Current, first of all, is dangerous for the heart, can cause it to stop.

First aid:

1. Isolate from current.
2. If the blow was strong and there is a chance that the wave has passed through all or half of the body - call the ambulance. The PMP memo reads: mandatory hospitalization, if there are signs of a general lesion, it does not matter if there is a trace of the blow or not. If all goes well, they will be discharged in 3 days. In any case, you need to do an ECG to make sure that the heart is not injured.
3. If a person is unconscious, there is no pulse or breathing, urgent resuscitation (indirect heart massage, artificial respiration) should be urgently performed and not stopped until consciousness appears or doctors arrive.

Treatment:

1. Treatment of traces of electric shock is the same as with a conventional burn.
2. It is very important to ensure peace if the electric shock was extensive (even if not strong) in order to reduce the load on the heart.

If a cat burns
Recognizing a burn in a pet can be difficult: the skin condition is poorly visible under the coat. The main trouble is that almost any burn is extensive (just because of the size of the cat). In this case, it is dangerous to cool - it is easy to freeze the pet itself. Therefore, you should immediately contact your veterinarian. Small burns pass quite quickly, they can be treated with an antiseptic, the same sea buckthorn oil. But only a specialist will give precise instructions.

How to protect your child from injury

To avoid chem. burns, you must follow safety precautions when working with caustic substances and keep children away from them. All household chemicals should be higher than the child reaches, standing on a stool or chair. A less effective option is under lock and key (six-year-old children usually quickly find a way around this obstacle).

As soon as the baby has learned to get up, forget that drinks can be drunk hot. Dilute to 50 degrees. If you are a gourmet, and diluted tea does not stick into your mouth - cool against the wall.

Remove everything hot from the edge by at least 20 cm (the baby stands on tiptoe and puts his hand on the countertop - speed and surprise do not leave a chance to grab the hand on time).

Put the iron in the cabinet, and if its place is on the windowsill - slide it into the far corner and be sure to wind the cord on the base of the device, otherwise the year-old must pull the device by the “tail”.

Of course, do not leave the iron on the board - if it does not tighten, it will push the board and dump the hot unit onto itself.

It is better not to leave the steam generator unattended or to close it in a separate room.

By the way, until the little one knocks at least 3, lock the kitchen and bathroom.

From six months, be sure to teach the child what is hot (bad, ay-ay-ay, bo-bo, etc.).

As soon as the baby began to brush his teeth and saw how to turn on the tap, begin to explain how to open the water correctly: first cold, then hot. If it is a lever - in what position should the flywheel be (usually - turned to the right by 35-45 degrees from the middle).

Do not let small or large children (under 8 years old) wear hot drinks. Even if the dexterous fellow confidently holds the cup by the handle, he will easily trip over a forgotten toy, or he will be caught by a cat / dog, or he will be pushed by a brother / sister who is upset and does not notice him.

If there is a steel or cast-iron bathtub - before you plant or place the crumbs there, touch the bottom with your hand (not only water - just the bottom). Capacity sometimes turns out to be too hot. For example, a caring grandmother “warmed up” the bath before bathing and overdid it. Or the water drained too long and managed to overheat the bottom. If the baby cries or complains with words that it is hot, it is better to believe the whims than later repent and heal injuries.

No one is 100% insured against a burn. At least each of us at least once burned in the sun.The main thing is not to panic and competently provide first aid. Weak injuries go away in a couple of days. Bubbles are usually treated for a week, sometimes two. If the burn is small in area and the consequences are one or two blisters, then do not worry. Treat at home with sea buckthorn oil and try not to spread dirt. In other cases, you need to see a doctor: call Ambulance or Ambulance or come to the burn department of the nearest hospital yourself.