aaronmcd

I've been using "nonstick" pads with neosporin, and have no idea why they are called nonstick. Took me 20 minutes in the shower and a lot of pain to remove it. Hoping tegaderm is less painful.

Ygduf

buy tegaderm rolls off amazon for the next go round. much cheaper that at a local CVS or whatever.

they also sell gauze that's soaked in petroleum jelly that works beneath regular gauze as a good makeshift for places tegaderm doesn't like to stick.

bleui

how do you make your wound moist/not dry? do you just pour water on it?

revchuck 

Use your favorite antibiotic ointment, keep it covered.

canuckbelle

What to do if you're getting wicked heat rash from the tegaderm? I'm worried about it scabbing over while I let it breathe.

Ygduf

how bigs the patch? smear neosporin over the wound and let surrounding skin dry a bit

canuckbelle

BIG, especially on my hip and back. I'll try the neosporin move next.

echappist

careful with the neosporin as you could develop an allergic reaction to it after prolonged use. Bacitricin may be better in this regard

Enthalpic

If you did the initial wound care using tegaderm and now have a "wicked heat rash" I would see a physician.

TMonk

This road rash on my hands sucks so bad, it's gonna make me start wearing gloves!

And I hate wearing gloves!

!

Ygduf

to be fair, I'm only a doctor on the internet.

Ygduf

could be like the time I crashed into poison oak!

Ygduf

not wearing gloves while wearing a bike is as dumb as wearing a cycling cap while wearing a bike

TMonk

love this.

Ygduf

because of the typo/word substitution, or the concept!?

TMonk

the concept, esp. the hating on the cycling-cap camp part. (of which I was a member in the past )

aaronmcd

I don't wear gloves OR a bike.

Ygduf

don't need either when you're crashing people out with your car, I guess!

raymond1354

Greetings:

Feel obligated to reply as I skimmed the posts and there is some really not good advice and some is potentially dangerous. To give my comments some validity, I should say that I deal with this stuff big time. Below is my take on how to manage “road rash”. The basics.It is only my take; there are other ways that could be better.

#1)Get in the shower and scrub out all the particles.Some of the deeper ones may need to be removed under anaesthetic -one at a time. This will keep a guy like me occupied for hours. Deep particles will tattoo the skin - and not the cool kind of tattoo you want.

#2)Keep it clean.


a)Shower everyday and use mild soap. A late infection is caused by bugson the normal skin so wash it off. Antibacterial soaps probably don't do so much.


b)The idea of ointments is to prevent early infections which can really screw things up. An antibacterial ointment is used. One of the best is Flamazine ('cause it has been shown to actually work) or sometimes something like Polysporin“Original” ( the original formula has polymixin and bacitracin only) for the face 'cause Flamazine is kind of messy.


I suggest you stay away from ointments that have a “mycin”antibiotic in them. What do I mean by a “mycin” antibiotic? Whenever you see “mycin”, the antibiotic is an “aminoglycoside”- and there are lots of them. The aminoglycosides can make you deaf and can be toxic to the kidneys. With a large surface area of wound a lot can be absorbed – enough could be absorbed to make you deaf or knock your kidneys off. Nothing worse than being on dialysis AND having road rash AND you can't listen to tunes.


You can also get allergic to all of them by exposure to one. This, also,is not such a good thing if later in life the only antibiotic that will save your life is an aminoglycoside. So, READ THE LABEL!



ASIDE- polysporin contains polymixin which does not do the above (as far as I know) and will not kill you unless, of course, it is given intravenously, which isn't even possible. So it's perfect for an ointment 'cause it has no other use. Polysporin also contains Bacitracin which is used to wash out contaminated wounds. Any of the other versions with other stuff, skip 'em.


#3) Shower the dressings off.“No Stick” is code for “Always Stick”. Don't bother. Shower them off and slobber on more ointment. When they really are sticking a lot, leave the wounds open to air and let them scab. Scabs are good. Scabs are biological band-aids. After 2 million years of research and evolution, the human body came up with scabs to heal wounds. They work. Leave them alone.


#4) See your Doc. If things don't seem to going right or you're sick or something, check in with someone who can help.


Remember: “If you live long enough you'll heal” My dad used to say that to me whenever I massacred myself. Nice guy. Miss him.

r

MoAlpha

Good info above. I would add the following:

1. Someone above mentioned Betadine "scrub." Do not use anything called "scrub"on a wound. Scrubs are antiseptic cleansers formulated for sterilizing intact skin, e.g., before surgery. They will kill viable tissue in a wound, inhibit healing, and predispose to infection. Instead use povidone iodine antiseptic solution to disinfect wounds after cleansing with running water in the shower or schpritzing them out with a syringe or something.

2. As mentioned above, a surprisingly large number of people are allergic to neosporin and bacitracin and the inflammation produced by the skin reaction can look like infection to the unpracticed eye. My totally personal preference, which no one should take as a recommendation, is to avoid antiseptic ointments and stick to Vaseline or Aquaphor, or generic equivalent, unless there is a particular concern for infection--deep wounds, questionable initial cleaning, austere or marine environment, or wound near the groin.

3. I am very fond of Spenco Second Skin® burn pads for road rash. They are wet slabs of gel (cellulose?), which really do not stick and involve no greasy ointments. No idea how they stack up against conventional dressings in clinical trials, but the cool factor is awesome. If someone knows more and they're terrible, I need to hear that.

4. Keeping RR covered and moist is very effective for pain.

5. Memories of crashing are probably the main thing keeping me from attempting to go back to racing, now that I'm back on the road bike and in shape after a few decades of doing other things.

6. Please correct any errors in the above. I am here to learn, as well as to bloviate. Yes, I am a health care professional, but a highly academic one and hyperspecialized in an area totally unrelated to road rash.

globecanvas

I read the whole thread while trying to figure out it I was supposed to not shower for the however many days I am supposed to leave the tegaderm on. Regardless of the right answer I'm going to take a shower even if it costs me $20 in new dressings every time.

Regarding road rash guard though ( @waterrockets, @carpediemracing, @shovelhd discussion a few pages back ) -- I've noticed these things on a particular racer's kit, and wondered what they heck they were. Ironically it's the same guy who crashed in front of me in yesterday's race which led directly to to me reading this thread. So maybe the moral is, if you see somebody with road rash guards on their kit, get in front of them.

shovelhd

Wrap the Tegaderm with Saran wrap before you take a shower.

Grumpy McTrumpy

Early on in the tegaderm process I was changing it daily anyway so I'd just shower then.

carpediemracing 

Leave on until the stuff underneath needs to get cleaned, then replace.

First set doesn't last long, third set pretty long (days?), 4th or 5th set should be last for most road rash.

I put stuff on top of the Tegaderm so my clothes don't pull at the Tegaderm corners.

Buy a pack from Amazon. $30 for 50 sheets or something like that. This is what I got according to Amazon:
https://www.amazon.com/Tegaderm-Trans...words=tegaderm

Do next day and you still beat the price of a dozen sheets from a pharmacy or whatever. Heck, I have Prime, I'll ship to you if you're not on Prime.

globecanvas

Ordered, thanks!

I'm "lucky" in that it's the whole inside forearm from elbow to wrist so it's really easy to dress it by wrapping the whole arm mummy style. I've been using vaseline under tegaderm, then nonstick gauze (just so it doesn't soak through) and then a gauze roll that I can tape to itself, so no tape on skin. Looking forward to that shower.