Nearly sliced tip of finger off, questions on infections

[Iakona]

So I was slicing some beef for dinner and ran the knife through the tip of my thumb, through the nail, and nearly out the other side.
I ran some hydrogen peroxide over it. Then I poured a little bowl of rubbing alcohol, and after staring at it for a few minutes, finally stuck it in and swished it around.

I was going to ask about infections specific to beef, but my wife just made me talk to the advice nurse, and she instructed me to wash it thoroughly with soap and water (meaning I have to peel it back and open it up again)
I guess I already knew that, but I was being a sissy and hoping to not have to do that.

Ahhh well, guess it's time to stop being a sissy

 

[Desdinova]

shaving nicks seem so minor after this...

do you think it will need stitches?

 

[Fnord5]

Pics would help.
I have cut my fingers numerous times while preparing beef, chicken, pork and fish, and have never done more than a quick rinse and a bandage. No infections.


And yeah I'm serious about the pics, gore is always appreciated here.

 

[Fairlight]

So I was slicing some beef for dinner and ran the knife through the tip of my thumb, through the nail, and nearly out the other side.
I ran some hydrogen peroxide over it. Then I poured a little bowl of rubbing alcohol, and after staring at it for a few minutes, finally stuck it in and swished it around.

I was going to ask about infections specific to beef, but my wife just made me talk to the advice nurse, and she instructed me to wash it thoroughly with soap and water (meaning I have to peel it back and open it up again)
I guess I already knew that, but I was being a sissy and hoping to not have to do that.

Ahhh well, guess it's time to stop being a sissy

Don't open it up again. You've already gone above and beyond the soap and water treatment. The current mainstream medical school of thought is that peroxide and isopropanol cause tissue damage compared to soap and water. They *do* have a greater disinfectant ability though, so IMO it's worth it ONCE for particularly nasty or dirty cuts.

From now on just clean around the wound with soap and water, and you should be fine. Do your best to keep it clean and dry; wear latex gloves if you have to.

Basically, the less you disturb the wound, the better. Given the circumstances of the cut, I'd have probably used peroxide on this particular wound myself. Further applications are probably counterproductive, though.

 

[Iakona]

Believe me, I didn't want to open it up again, but I've seen too many movies where a guy cuts his finger and gets cow parts into the cut, then turns into a mad cow zombie. Ok well not really, but I didn't want to take any chances. I wish I knew where the camera charger was - maybe I'll see if I can get a cell phone pic up. Overall, I guess it isn't that bad - I'm just weary of infections at this point.

As for the stitches question, it doesn't seem like there's a lot to stitch. Plus, I don't want to go through the hassle of actually going to the doc.

On the plus side, I seem to have pretty good blood clotting capabilities. Of course I suppose that too much of that isn't a good thing.

 

[Wisdom]

Iakona..

I've sliced myself pretty "good" with all sorts of knives in the past.. butterfly and combat knives.. a few times down to the bone. I recommend a Chinese medicine called "Yun Nan Bai Yao.." Write it down, and go to a Chinese medicine shop (sometimes Chinese grocery stores will carry it, too).. it's some sort of miracle powder that stops bleeding, prevents infection, and promotes healing. If you read the box, it even says it's good for things like bullet wounds.. those crazy Chinese

Anyway.. when you get it, there's a red pellet inside that you probably won't have to use in your case (it's for internal injuries).. just tap some powder in and on your wound, put some Neosporin on the outside, over the powder, and bandage it up.

Trust me.. this stuff is the bomb. The bleeding stops quickly and as long as you don't squeeze the injury open, it heals together, without any part of the finger drying up, dying, and falling off.

Yun Nan Bai Yao..
-\Visdom

 

[Fairlight]

If you're worried about infections, just consider that every time you open it up, you introduce new bacteria to the wound from the air and surrounding skin. It's important to wash inside the wound at first, but afterwards you should just keep the surrounding area clean. If the flap of skin is happy to stick in place, I would say you won't need stitches. How sharp was the knife? Sharper == cleaner cut, faster healing, less scarring.

 

[rfm2]

Agree with Fairlight - don't use any more 'antiseptics' on it, just plain soap / water a couple times a day. Look out for rubor dolor calor tumor - redness, increasing pain, heat and swelling - over the next few days. These are the classic signs of infection. It'll be sore and throb for the next day or so, but should start to feel progressively better soon, so worsening of any of the above may be an indication for systemic antibiotics. You won't get any exotic infections from the cut - staph and / or strep are the most common wound infection bacteria. Also, lay off the Neosporin and it's ilk, they don't help prevent infection (despite what the ads say) and only increase your chance of becoming allergic to the antibiotic in them (trust me, I'm a doctor ).

Also, is your tetanus shot up to date? You should get another if it's been more than 5 years.

 

[Fairlight]

Agree with Fairlight - don't use any more 'antiseptics' on it, just plain soap / water a couple times a day.

... and only on the OUTSIDE of the wound. It's never a good idea to reopen the wound after the first day. It drastically increases the risk of infection and scarring, as well as slowing down healing.

 

[Iakona]

Don't worry guys, not opening it up anymore. I did it because I know I didn't do a good job of it in the first place - it was only about 20 minutes old by the time I gave it a thorough proper cleaning.

For those wanting pics:

Hmm, well either B&B, or my own connection is having problems, I'll see if I can get the pics up on photobucket.



squeamish mod edit: kinda nauseating. just sayin' click at your own risk!

Spoiler

 

[Fnord5]

Aww ****, that's just a scratch!.

Seriously though, I was expecting far worse. In a month or two, you wont even know anything happened.

 

[Iakona]

Aww ****, that's just a scratch!.

Seriously though, I was expecting far worse. In a month or two, you wont even know anything happened.

Yeah, it's not that bad, but it didn't feel good. The worst was prying it back open. Really though, just worried about infection as I didn't clean it out well enough when it was fresh - was too much of a baby

 

[luvmysuper]

Ahhh...

A kitchen accident.

I was expecting some gory razor story.

Hope you heal well and heal soon.

 

[Iakona]

Ahhh...

A kitchen accident.

I was expecting some gory razor story.

Hope you heal well and heal soon.

I would say that I wasn't *that* clumsy as to do it while shaving, but then again, you can see a scar in pic 2 that zig-zags up my finger (doc had to make 2 extra cuts to find ends of tendon to reattach) so I am fairly accident prone while handling sharp objects. Anyone want to bet how long before my next injury post?

 

[Cynomys]

Have you had a tetanus shot in the past 10 years? If not, maybe you should think about getting one.

 

[luvmysuper]

I would say that I wasn't *that* clumsy as to do it while shaving, but then again, you can see a scar in pic 2 that zig-zags up my finger (doc had to make 2 extra cuts to find ends of tendon to reattach) so I am fairly accident prone while handling sharp objects. Anyone want to bet how long before my next injury post?

My advice would be stick with a Tech and avoid the straights!!!

 

[Cynomys]

Me again. I don't mean to scare anybody, but . . .

Quoting from Walter Harding's "Days of Henry Thoreau" regarding the death of his brother John:

"In January 1842, tragedy struck the Thoreau household. On New Years Day, John, Jr. was stropping his razor when it slipped and cut off a little piece from the end of the ring finger of his left hand. It was a very slight cut, just deep enough to draw blood. Replacing the skin, he put on a bandage and paid no more attention to it for several days. . . . by midweek he noticed pains in the finger and when he removed his bandage on the 8th he found part of the replaced skin had 'mortified'. That evening he called on Dr. Bartlett, who dressed the finger but thought nothing unusual of it. On the way home, John had strange sensations and acute pains, and was barely able to reach the house. That night he was seized with violent spasms and lockjaw set in. . .. He died at two o'clock on Tuesday afternoon, January 11 . . ."

Again, I'm not trying to scare anybody. Just get a tetanus shot if you haven't done so already.

 

[Kouros]

Bacitracin and a fresh bandaid twice a day for two weeks.

 

[Mr_Amazing]

I have done nearly the same thing. I was carving some wood and the knife slipped and managed to lop off the end of my index finger (some nail, some flesh). Granted, I didn't have the concerns regarding raw meat, so I just made sure it stopped bleeding before I went after it with the soap and water. It healed up nicely after a fair amount of time and I didn't get any infections. Just make sure to keep it bandaged with a fair amount of neosporin. Just make sure to remove the bandages for an hour or two every day so that the skin can dry out a bit.

 

[Walter Sobchak]

Ouch, maybe not the worst cut in the world, but certainly not a great location to have it. Ever do the super glue thing? I've not done it on a flap like that. I've found that flaps usually want to go back together and don't take much to make 'em stay.

Sorry to see that, though. It's gonna be a pain for a few days, I'm sure. Hope it heals up nicely and quickly. Beef always gets its revenge!!!