Tips/Tricks to Heal Incisions After Radiation?
I had my DIEP on 2/20. My non-radiated side and abdomen healed beautifully, my radiated side...not so much. The flap is fine, but the radiated skin necrotized shortly after surgery. After a few weeks of wound care and debridement, I had skin grafted to that breast on 3/18. Some of the grafted skin took, some didn't, so I had another skin graft on 4/19 to the same area. After each graft I have the wound vac for two weeks, so the latest wound vac was removed yesterday. The grafted skin is already bleeding and painful, and I don't think it's going to stick.
We've tried silvadene, various wraps/dressings, the wound vacs, wound care drinks (Juven) and multivitamins. I sleep on my back, I don't lift more than five pounds and don't lift my arms above my shoulders. I'm 45 with no other health issues.
Doe anybody have tips or tricks for getting radiated skin to heal after surgery? This is terrible, for any number of reasons. I just feel like we keep doing the same thing over and over, and it's not working.
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A lady in my local bc group had thus, she ended up going to a surgical wound specialist. She had open wound for a year. Part I think was due to chemo,
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@nns121317 we agree with @herb that if you haven't already visited a wound specialist, it would probably be the next step, as you've done so much already, and you certainly don't want it to get infected.
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