Road rash - the fixing and making betterer of

After a 25mph get off on Friday morning I find myself with a nasty holed knee and a dinner plate sized part of my thigh that is completely devoid of skin 😔

I got home after the accident and showered straight away and scrubbed the grit and road grime from my wounds and bought some germolene which I've been using daily but the pain is horrible still, more so the thigh than the knee

Does anyone have any pointers to aid road rash healing or is it a case of time and infection management? I'm fairly well covered in tattoos so used to open wounds and looking after them but something about this feels different (maybe the force at hitting the road has bruised me too which hasn't come out yet)

Pointers, sympathy and tales of you smearing yourself up the road great fully received 😫

HTFU.

Either that or go to the doctor.

Actually, the second one. I've successfully germolene-skinned my way through a couple of hip scrapes but yours sounds nasty. For the sake of half an hour, have it looked at.

You've got a choice basically, get it covered or don't get it covered.

The more modern approach is to cover it up and keep it wet to stop it drying out.

The old school approach is to let it dry out and scab over.

They both have their advantages, old school will heal faster but scar more, more modern reduces scarring and short term pain but will take longer to heal and you'll have to change the dressing.

I had a nasty off last summer and the hospital in Germany went for the old school approach, if I'd known I would have asked for a dressing to reduce scarring.

Too late now but it's a myth that you need to scrub road rash. Clean it yes, but scrubbing it is just masochistic and unnecessary.

You could try going without the germolene for a bit, it doesn't do much anyway, and you may have a mild allergy. Ask at the pharmacy.

Thigh was the bit giving me the most pain. That healed up by last week. The knee wound that had given me no hassle has scabbed but not healed in 3 weeks since the crash. Climbed off the turbo today and the foulest smelling yellow and brown goo oozed from it and down my leg

TL;DR - I'm now on antibiotics for a mild infection
/csb

I've just been through a week or of mild agony after coming off in a roundabout in the rain. I work in a hospital so got a OR nurse to give me some modern stuff for dressing the scraped bits on my thigh, ie a perforated silicone film first and a big waterproof absorbent thing on top to cover everything. It did ooze a bit at first but it looks better now than other times when I've just let the wounds dry and scab. Pic of my hairy hip free of charge!

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I had road rash on my face, it seemed to leave a feint grey shadow which turned out to be tiny bits of grit that I had to squeeze out like little blackheads.

This thread is useless without pictures, I was expecting to see something absolutely disgusting that would make me regret clicking on this thread.

Hey, I made a feeble effort at least!

cling film works ok. keeps it moist, so the actual skin heals faster, but you can change it everyday after a shower to avoid it getting all smelly like the second skin stuff.

Ive been using a wet bandage approach; as I had deep lacerations on my knees and elbows that needed wound dressings, so leaving the road rash uncovered wasn't an option.

A wet bandage is fairly simple, just cover the rash in vaseline before dressing the bandage.
I can also recommend specialist burn plasters ask for them from behind the counter or pay extra for the hydrocolloid ones which help things stay cool.

I can tell you that washing the offending area in a cattle trough and then covering it in gorrilla tape does not work well and may lead to hospitalisation.

In my defence I was concussed.

There are military issue dressing that contain silvernodor used as battle dressings. Hard to find but i did get some in a pack at a pound shop once . Buy now for later is my advise .

.

I was very happy with Hydrocolloid dressings from Boots for my thankfully minor off - stayed on really well (even when getting a bit wet) and you kind of forget you have it on. Changed the dressing 3x over the course of about 7 days and it was all pretty much healed when. I imagine they are tough to find in a larger format for more serious road rash though.

.

Useful thread ta, managed 9yrs no Road Rash. Going to try pick up Hydrocolloid dressings tomorrow.

Pics Day 1, & now Day 3.

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P.s. shower on day 1 was bad bad bad idea.

Antiseptic wipes & low adherence dressings so far.

Bathing tomorrow morning after first night sleeping 'open'.

What's 100x worse is also picked up a horsefly bite yesterday. #itchy

Dredge.
After my off yesterday I dressed my grazed hip about 10x10cm having cleaned it. Today in the shower it I took / it came off. So currently slathered in savlon with a dressing over it.
It doesn’t look too great and it’s more uncomfortable than it was pre shower.
I went to the pharmacist who had very little in the way of dressing none of which seemed appropriate.
Second pharmacist also didn’t have much and suggested I should see a wound nurse either at the GP (which seems impossible currently) or Hospital.
I really don’t want to go to the hospital because one it’s quite minor and two I’ll be there forever given how minor, in the scheme of things, it is.
Is there an alternative in SE area that has good stock of dressings ideally open late? Or should I suck up a hospital wait?

I really struggled with this and after going to a few Pharmacists in Catford ended up buying Tegaderm dressings off Amazon (boo). I don't have Prime but it was still next day delivery.

I ended up changing the dressing daily with a gentle wash in the shower and a new layer of Savalon. This allowed a soft scab to form but never dried out. Took over 2 weeks for it heal but it healed much better than my previous attempts.

I've found it's pot luck whether pharmacies have Hydrocolloid dressings, and the ones that do have at best 5cm x 5cm ones which are probably too small. Maybe try the pharmacies of the Asda and Sainos in Charlton retail park? There's Lloyds and Blackheath standard pharmacies just off Westcombe Hill, open until 7pm. Latest I can find after a quick google is Grove Pharmacy just off Charlton Village (SE7 8UG) open until 11pm apparently, wouldn't hang my hat on that though. Looks a bit shit though and not great reviews but you never know.

As a backup I'd order some hydrocolloid dressings of Jeff's World for delivery tomorrow if you have Prime, if you don't PM me and i'll get them for you.

Tegaderm

Can confirm that this, or similar, is teh shizzle.

Thanks I’ll investigate!

They have a walk in gp type service in hospitals, I've used the one at guys in London bridge in the past and it was relatively quick. Search for urgent care centre, sure there will be others around if that's not close

Non absorbent Gauze + savlon + cling film + micropore/similar tape round the edges?