# Skinned knees, scabs, incisions, stitches and healing **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 30, 2006, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607 "2006-07-30T21:52:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Eureka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/74df32/32.png) [@Eureka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eureka)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2006, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/1 "2006-07-30T21:52:39Z")
Not looking for medical advice. Rather, having read **gabriela’s** discourse on how the digestive system works, I’m hoping that she, or another one of our knowledgable medical personnel, would be willing to talk a little bit about what happens when people skin knees, accidently cut themselves with knives, have incisions from surgery, and how such skin wounds heal. I’m also curious about how stitches affect the healing process, in cases where stitches are involved, and just generally what one can do which promotes healing, and what one should avoid doing so it won’t delay healing. Mostly though, I’m curious about how our bodies heal injuries. ---
**Author:** ![Tikkiw](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/e68b1a/32.png) [@Tikkiw](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tikkiw)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/2 "2006-07-31T00:38:11Z")
Is there a specific question there? “How we heal” would be enough information for a large book of theses. ---
**Author:** ![gabriela](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/db5fbb/32.png) [@gabriela](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gabriela)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 10:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/3 "2006-07-31T10:26:19Z")
I’m planning on making one, but it will have to wait - too much to get done this AM, going on a long business trip soon (no I am not bringing any cadavers with me - first one to make a joke about carrion luggage gets a scalpel between the teeth). I’m debating pleasureably between the microscopic answer (what the heck is going on down there as cells scramble to repair the canyons caused by a paper cut) and the macroscopic answer (what is the difference between a cut and a laceration). Probably the latter since I can put in pictures from standard Web sites. Anyone feel his or her lower lip pushing out at the thought of neglecting the cells, please reply. ---
**Author:** ![spingears](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@spingears](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/spingears)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/4 "2006-07-31T14:32:30Z")
[QUOTE=gabriela] I’m planning on making one, but it will have to wait … [/QUOTE] Don’t forget to comment on liquid bandage. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/5 "2006-07-31T17:03:09Z")
There is no difference between a cut and a laceration. The latter is just a fancy medical term used by fancy medical people because they like to be fancy. As for the other stuff…well, I don’t know enough about it, so we’ll let someone else explain it or provide a link. ---
**Author:** ![picunurse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/7bcc69/32.png) [@picunurse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/picunurse)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/6 "2006-07-31T18:46:23Z")
[QUOTE=bouv] There is no difference between a cut and a laceration. The latter is just a fancy medical term used by fancy medical people because they like to be fancy. As for the other stuff…well, I don’t know enough about it, so we’ll let someone else explain it or provide a link. [/QUOTE] Sorry, but the fancy medical term for “cut” is incision. A laceration is a tear, with irregular edges. Lacerations may still be sutured, but the scar may be more noticable than with a nice even cut. I’ll try a short overview to get started, **gabriela** can finish when she returns from her trip. A skinned knee is an abrasion. The shallow surface of the skin (epidermis) is interrupted. Blood oozes out from broken capillaries (vessels so tiny, only a single cell can pass through at a time.) In the blood are various chemicals that, when exposed to air, change into microscopic threads, called fibrin strings. There are a number of reactions in the process, but we’ll let **gabriela** go through the clotting cascade, if she has time. Along with the chemical clotting mechanism, come platelets, (Tiny, sticky discs. We have about 300,000 in the blood) that form a physical barrier as they are caught in the fibrin strings. White blood cells also rush to the injury to take care of any bacteria that have entered through the wound. The process of fibrin, platelets, and white cells continues until the wound has a thick covering, we call a scab. The healthy skin cells multiply under the scab, until the area is completely healed, then the scab falls away, leaving healthy, pink skin, once again. Because the injury isn’t deep, this is often all that need happen for healing to occur. All wounds, heal in, basicly, the same way. Deeper wounds have more structures to heal, and more opportunity for bacteria to enter. Sutures are placed on deep, large wounds to draw the edges together, allowing the clotting cascade to do its work. This will allow the separate structures to heal together, as well as control bleeding. I know this is a rather simple explaination, but it’s a start. ---
**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/7 "2006-07-31T19:08:50Z")
[QUOTE=picunurse] Sorry, but the fancy medical term for “cut” is incision. A laceration is a tear, with irregular edges. Lacerations may still be sutured, but the scar may be more noticable than with a nice even cut. [/QUOTE] Hmm…then why is it I have only ever heard the term ‘laceration’ to describe injuries when one is cut and taken to the hospital? I was a member of a volunteer fire/ambulance crew, and the term laceration was always used, never cut or incision (which I always thought was a _purposeful_ cut, like for surgery.) Is it just that most people (like me, it seems) don’t know better? These were trained EMTs, so maybe that’s just not something they spend a lot of time on in an EMT course? ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 7:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/8 "2006-07-31T19:58:56Z")
[QUOTE=bouv] Hmm…then why is it I have only ever heard the term ‘laceration’ to describe injuries when one is cut and taken to the hospital? I was a member of a volunteer fire/ambulance crew, and the term laceration was always used, never cut or incision (which I always thought was a _purposeful_ cut, like for surgery.) Is it just that most people (like me, it seems) don’t know better? These were trained EMTs, so maybe that’s just not something they spend a lot of time on in an EMT course? [/QUOTE] As far as I’m aware from my first responder training, any cut you don’t personally see someone make with intent to do it correctly and neatly is a laceration–it’s not so much intent as assuming the worst when talking on the radio to actual docs. In point of fact, it’s a rare accidental cut that reaches a level of precision and non-torn-ness that qualifies it as an “incision”. ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [July 31, 2006, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/9 "2006-07-31T20:36:44Z")
[QUOTE=Zeriel] In point of fact, it’s a rare accidental cut that reaches a level of precision and non-torn-ness that qualifies it as an “incision”. [/QUOTE] Presumably because most accidental cuts aren’t done with anything as sharp as a surgical scalpel. ---
**Author:** ![Eureka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/74df32/32.png) [@Eureka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eureka)\ **Post date:** [August 1, 2006, 12:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/skinned-knees-scabs-incisions-stitches-and-healing/366607/10 "2006-08-01T00:32:13Z")
Thank you, **picunurse** , for your informative post. Additional information, from anyone qualified to give it, will of course be appreciated, but your answer will satisfy for now–especially since I have to leave town abruptly and will likely not see this thread for a few days.