Owen and I headed out early Thursday morning, while Scott got the kids off to school and dropped Kate at a friend's house. The hand doctor turned out to be wonderful. He sang songs with Owen and Owen loved him. After examining Owen's fingers, he said, "We can either take the drastic route, where we take him into surgery and clean it out and do skin grafts, or we can take the conservative route and just do exactly what you are doing now with burn care and bandage changes". He said he would take the conservative route for now, and if it did heal with limited mobility, then they could always go back and do surgery and skin grafts later. He instructed me to up the bandage changes to 2 to 3 times a day, and before every bandage change to soak his fingers in a solution of water, soap, and hydrogen peroxide to clean out all the dead tissue. He also told me to start splinting Owen's fingers straight when I bandaged them so the skin would have to stretch as it healed, and to do finger exercises (opening and closing his fingers into a fist) anytime we had the bandages off. He also told me to start taking pictures daily, so we could track his healing, and to come back in one week.
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| Getting up early for the hand doctor, wore this kid out. He fell asleep on the drive home. |
Looking through the following pictures, it amazes me what a difference one week of healing has made.
One night, Owen got bored in bed, and picked off all the skin from the blisters.
Scott took Owen back for his follow up appointment this past week, and the doctor said his fingers were looking great! We have to keep soaking them, and bandaging occasionally, but he can have them exposed to air more and more now. He gets to go back January 8th for another follow up appointment, but the doctor said they should continue to heal just fine.
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