There just doesn’t seem to be a whole lot of information out there about them.
My husband had knee replacement surgery on Oct. 31. Immediately following the surgery, he developed one large and several smaller fracture blisters on his shin. They were responsible for the worst of his post-op pain, by far. They eventually healed and the rest of his post-op experience has been entirely unremarkable.
He’s a little more than three months post-op now – and he’s suddenly developed large, painful blisters on his shin again. What’s up with that?
I haven’t been able to find any info about fracture blisters occurring months after the causative incident. Anyone have personal experience with this? Can any of our Doper MDs shed light?
Yeah, there’s not a lot out there. They are apparently not very common, so not a lot is known about them. It appears from what I’m reading that the greatest risk with them is infection if the blisters rupture. Has your husband seen a wound care specialist or an infectious disease physician? Three months postop seems a little outside the normal window for fracture blisters, so I’d be concerned there might be some other process involved. (Shingles, maybe?)
If he’s had rupture of a blister, I think heading directly for the physician’s office is a good idea so they can culture the fluid and possibly start him on antibiotics. He doesn’t want to mess around with possible infections that could penetrate to his knee prosthesis and require another operation.
Of course, IANAD or even a health care provider, so my opinion is always to check with the appropriate medical sources. With any luck, one of our Dopermeds will be along with some better info for you.
I hadn’t either until someone in my husband’s knee replacement “cohort” who was getting his second knee done mentioned what terrible fracture blisters he’d had with his first TKR. It wasn’t even mentioned in the pre-op class that we attended.
Since he’s also diabetic, you’re right, Sudden Kestrel, an infection is definitely not something to be risked.
I saw someone once who had these happen after his knee replacement, he had a knee immobilizer placed until they healed. The main problem was that a recent knee replacement in an immobilizer gets stiff, so we had to focus on making his knee move. There were skin discolorations where the blisters had been, but they had healed. They caused no other troubles. He reports they were very painful.