Today's "Lesson from the OR" is that Fire, Gasoline and Alcohol do not mix.
We did a skin graft on a 20 something year old who basically lit his leg on fire. It was not a pretty sight. I've seen a lot of stuff in my time in the OR. Last week we had a patient die on the table. Bled out. I cleaned him up, put him in the body bag, put on the toe tag, etc. Gross I know. Skin grafts however kind of make me qweezy. Here's why.
The surgeon needs to get rid of all the bad skin that was damaged so he takes a huge, long, flat blade and basically scraped the dead skin off. Imagine the old school, wild-west-like barber shaving a mans neck with that long shiny blade and warm foam. No warm foam here, just bright red blood seeping through the skin and draining down the drapes. Once the area is prepped the surgeon shaves some good skin off a different area of the leg, again like a barber. It goes through a cool little grinder that puts little holes in the skin so it can stretch and cover more surface area. It then gets staples to the area in need then wrapped up in all sorts of dressings. 5 days later you're good as new.
Skin is facinating but gross.
So today's lesson: Fire and Gasoline are A-Okay but don't throw in Alcohol. Three's a crowd.
We did a skin graft on a 20 something year old who basically lit his leg on fire. It was not a pretty sight. I've seen a lot of stuff in my time in the OR. Last week we had a patient die on the table. Bled out. I cleaned him up, put him in the body bag, put on the toe tag, etc. Gross I know. Skin grafts however kind of make me qweezy. Here's why.
The surgeon needs to get rid of all the bad skin that was damaged so he takes a huge, long, flat blade and basically scraped the dead skin off. Imagine the old school, wild-west-like barber shaving a mans neck with that long shiny blade and warm foam. No warm foam here, just bright red blood seeping through the skin and draining down the drapes. Once the area is prepped the surgeon shaves some good skin off a different area of the leg, again like a barber. It goes through a cool little grinder that puts little holes in the skin so it can stretch and cover more surface area. It then gets staples to the area in need then wrapped up in all sorts of dressings. 5 days later you're good as new.
Skin is facinating but gross.
So today's lesson: Fire and Gasoline are A-Okay but don't throw in Alcohol. Three's a crowd.
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