Anyone here with wound VAC experience? TMFI!

In My Humble Opinion
1

As some of you may know from previous threads, I had a hysterectomy almost a year ago (Feb 29th 2008, to be specific). There was one part of the incision that refused to heal. For months, various docs said “Be patient; it’ll heal”, but it never did. After several months of therapy (by which they mean torture) at the wound clinic, it was decided that the correct path was more surgery.

Good thing I had the surgery. The incision wasn’t healing because not only was my body trying to reject the sutures my hyst surgeon had used, but they had become infected, some with MRSA! :eek: Because of this, the surgery required quite a bit more cutting than my surgeon had anticipated, and a much larger incision resulted.

So, now, it’ll be three weeks tomorrow since my second surgery, and the wound is infected, and not healing well. It’s oozing and draining and doing all kinds of nasty stuff (and this is the worst fuckin’ time in the world for my washing machine to die, but that’s what’s happened. . .). So, on Tuesday, I went back to the wound clinic (at the order of my surgeon). The wound tech who treated me cleaned me up, cleaned me out, made me say bad words (in spite of the fact that I took Darvocet in advance), but said she thought I’d need a wound VAC to really get it to heal well. She said she’s going to consult with the surgeon to get one ordered, then petition my insurance company to pay for it.

Now, my insurance rocks, and I’m sure they won’t bat an eyelash. But I’ve been reading up online about these things.

The up-sides are: One, it should cut my healing time by about half.
Two, it will do away with the rank odor my wound has been giving off, which no amount of personal hygiene fixes.

The down-sides: One, I’ll have to carry this damned thing around with me everywhere I go until I am pronounced sufficiently healed.
Two, I’ve heard that getting fitted with the proper sponges (inside the wound) hurts like a sonofabitch.

So, I’m asking for experiences, the good, the bad and the ugly.

If you’ve had one of these, if you have a close family member or friend who’s had one, please tell me whatever you can!

As an aside, I am beyond sick of dealing with this whole fucking thing. Who’d have thunk that a freakin’ year after a hysterectomy, I’d still be worrying about bleeding on the bed sheets, changing my underwear/clothes three times a day, and all that crap?

2

My only experience was all in hospital with sponge changes done while I was under anesthesia to have my wound debrided. I had no idea they were available for home use. How do you handle the biowaste issue?

Good luck with this, I have heard they make a big difference.

3

Well, once I get one, I’ll have to go to the wound clinic three times a week and let them handle the biowaste.

For now, hopefully holding me until Monday, I have something called a ‘wound manager’, which is very much like a colostomy bag for the wound. Everything will, theoretically, drain into there, from where I can empty it into the toilet or some such.

Thanks for the good wishes!

4

I was filling a 250 ml container 2-3 times a day for almost 3 weeks(after the coma) as I was sloughing tissue and still had light bleeding. I had a degloving wound involving the entire back of the thigh. I did need a skin graft but it healed perfectly. I presume your incision is smaller and I would expect you should have a good outcome.

Pictures of my leg. Some may find these disturbing.

Leg
Leg2

I really think the VAC had much to do with the excellent outcome I had and whatever hassle it will be it will be worth it.

5

It’s not THAT bad at all…
My hubby had one last spring/summer for about 12 weeks.
The pack isn’t THAT big to carry around… it is a PIA to drive with. I suggest you seatbelt it in next to you – it’s not fun to have that thing fly around the car. The little waste collection canister is on there! It’s not going to come off & if it did it’s made so nothing nasty can escape.
Once the wound starts to really heal the dressing changes really don’t hurt. Honestly, it’s not going to be as bad as you think it might. Hubby wound was large, 19in down his abdomen… split right down the middle.

You’re not going to be able to shower with it. After we got used to the damn thing we would just undo the dressing & have him pop in the shower before he had the dressing changed. The water is good for the wound… just plan on covering it & getting right to the Dr. for a new dressing.
We tried covering it and showering (hubby was too chicken to let the wound xome into contact with water for a long time) and inevitably some moisture/condensation got under the dressing tape and he grew a NASTY yeast infection. BLAH!

Good luck! Your time tied to the machine will said by and you’ll be back to your old non infected self before you know it… FWIW, hubby was dealing with VRE. Once the wound vac was off we still had to pack the hole at least 8 more weeks (2x a day!) – all total from day 1 to the very end of wound care was 4.5 months. I hope you’ve got someone who can help you out. :slight_smile:

Take care,
Terra

6

My mom had one after her second mastectomy last fall. She’s diabetic – many have wound healing issues – and she just wasn’t healing.

For her, the yuck factor of an unhealed wound and the stress about not healing, and the fear of infection, outweighed the discomfort and inconvenience of the wound vac. She was initially reluctant for the same reasons as you – thought it would hurt, knew it would look like toting around a toaster with hoses running under her shirt, maybe for weeks. (And, yes, for her it was weeks.) But she quickly found it wasn’t that bad. Her wound care people came to see her (home health) and while there was some discomfort, it wasn’t terrible. (But all wounds are different, of course.) And she got use to toting around the machine; it is what it is, so what are you gonna do?

Once she was on the wound vac, I think she felt more in control of the process. She felt she had taken a concrete step towards fixing her problem and literally healing herself. She was very upset about the situation before she got the wound vac, so any step towards healing was a positive step for her.

7

Whoa. Glad you’re ok.

Whoa.

8

runner pat, the way I’m feeling today, I didn’t even click on those links! But I’m glad you’re OK. :cool:

Everyone else, thanks for the input.

9

They’re not bloody or anything, about two years post accident. Just wanted you to see how well the wound and graft had healed.

10

Oh, OK. Thanks for the clarification. I had a look.
It actually looks a lot like my father’s shoulder did, after they grafted a bunch of skin off of it to use on his face when he had skin cancer on his right cheek.

I think it was about two years before he’d come out of his bedroom without a T-shirt on.

I’m not so worried about the appearance of my wound. For one thing, it’s abdominal, very easily covered. For another thing, once this is all done with and I can brace myself for another surgery (may take a while!), I’m getting a tummy tuck, which should take a lot of the current scarring with it.

11

I’ve been toting one around since December.

In December, I had a baseball sized abcess removed from the right cheek of my booty. The infection was almost to the bone. After two surgeries, they inserted a wound vac on about my fourth day in the hospital. The first time hurt like a son of a bitch, but then again, I’d just had surgery.

I spent eleven days in the hospital, two weeks in rehab and have been home since. I even got special security clearance to return to work with it tomorrow.

As far as the dressing changes go, I go to the wound care center three times a week. The staff there is very professional and usually, I read or talk to my treatment nurse while they’re changing me out. Not painful, but sometimes slightly uncomfortable.

I take a modified shower on dressing change days and a bird bath the days in between and the only time there has been any noticable odor was when I had a slight secondary infection.

Currently, the outside of the wound is healing wonderfully, but there is still a part of the deep tunnel that is holding up progress. I may have to have some more minor surgery for debridement, but it won’t be anything major if I do at all.

I walk for excercise with the vac (it only weighs four pounds and has its own handy-dandy shoulder bag), drive (it goes under the seatbelt) and as I mentioned earlier, will return to work with it.

I have only developed a leak once and that was with the infection. It was messy for an evening until I got to the wound care center the next morning. Keep a couple of chucks around if you don’t want to have to suddenly change the sheets.

The things that I miss the most are full showers and aqua aerobics. I can’t wait to be all healed up and drain a hot water heater or two! Hopefully, it won’t be that much longer.

According to the wound care doctor, as late as fifteen years ago, I would likely have been in a hospital or rehab center for six months or more for wet to dry dressing changes twice a day, so I think that this is a vast improvement.

Hope you have good results with yours. If you have any questions that I can answer, e-mail me.

12

I work in a nursing home where I’ve had the experience of working with them here and there.

I can’t add too much else to what has been said above except to keep everything as sanitary as possible. MRSA is a nasty sonofabitch and finds its way into everything, especially around hospitals. Wash your hands before you even think about the wound vac. And try to avoid locations and touching things that everyone and their cousin has touched (door handles, elevator buttons, etc. etc…).

We have skin to keep those nasty things out. If you have a hole in it that isn’t healing well it doesn’t take much to get one of those nasty things in there (even with the seal around the wound to keep suction.
I’d say of the ten or so wound vac patients I’ve worked with four or five of them had their wounds infected with MRSA. Some obtained it out of the facility and their debilitated state required them to move to the nursing home and some obtained it from the facility itself. It is everywhere, a coworker did a test for a college class and found it not only on many surfaces in the building but on public bus handles, taxi seats, etc…
Just a word of advice.

13

Thanks for the advice, clayton.
In fact, since this surgery, I’ve become such a hand-washing fiend that several of my cuticles have cracked from over-drying!

Still, I know MRSA is a nasty sumbitch, and I don’t want to screw with it!

14

Sorry. I have to ask.

What the hell happened?

15

Got hit bicycling to work by a pickup/horse trailer.

16

I had the wound VAC off for about a week, because the paste that holds on the “drape” (the stuff they put around it to seal off the area) irritated my skin so much that they had to give me a break from it.

However: I got it put back on yesterday, and the surgeon herself made an appearance to look at the wound. She told me that it would be her guess that it will be completely closed in three weeks! Yay!!

17

Good news, norinew. I hope the three weeks pass quickly. :slight_smile:

18

That’s great news!!!

19

Cool! I’m jealous.:slight_smile:

20

I’ll keep my fingers crossed that it’ll be your turn soon!

Oh, and they still haven’t let me shower! Ugh. Tomorrow will be seven weeks since surgery, no shower! I’ll be draining the hot water heater myself. I think I’ll stay in the shower for about 90 minutes or something! :cool: