I dipped my arm in boiling milk while on vacation and got a severe hand burn. Since there was no doctor available (I went to the country for my vacation), I spend several days trying to make things better by putting my tooth paste on the wound in order to cool it. It really was painful. I didn’t know what else to do. I also poured water on it and I believed that it was nothing serious. Now I’m home and it is still very painful, red and ugly - looking. There are more blisters and I have the need to scratch at exactly that place. Is there anyone with the hand burn experience? Is this going to heal soon
I was in a similar situation two years ago when I accidentally pressed my arm against the door of the oven (a stupid thing to do, I know). Blisters and redness appeared in the blink of an eye. I was alone and very busy and didn’t think it would complicate so I decided to be my own doctor. But on the third day it became unbearable - I couldn’t move my arm properly, blisters kept popping and it was so painful I couldn’t sleep. On the forth day I went to the doctors’ and he almost killed me. He shouted at me for not coming sooner and kept asking if I were mad etc. But he was right - as it turned, out those were second degree burns or partial thickness burns and they were serious. I didn’t cover the wound to stop infection which is possible in these cases and I also used the tooth paste - that enraged my doctor. Using any material, liquid or anything else that is not sterile is basically a sin when it comes to burns. On the list of things both you and I should have done is also placing silver sulfadiazine on the wound. So I did everything wrong and managed to infect my wound. I had to take Vicodin to ease the pain and some antibiotic pills to alleviate the infection. Second degree burns heal for about two to three weeks without scars, but due to this infection my wound couldn’t heal properly and I still have the scar, two years from then, and its very ugly. So don’t hesitate go to have your hand burn checked.