The end of January left me incredibly happy. My surgeon had discontinued the Wound VAC and so it and all of the associated supplies were no longer taking up valuable space in my room. In addition, arrangements were made for the Clinitron At-Home bed to be picked up and for a new regular mattress to be delivered.
The nurses and my surgeon continued to treat the wound with the Calcium Alginate inside of the wound and then a dry dressing on top of it from mid January until the beginning of February when my surgeon said we were going to change what we were using. While I have pretty much always been a believer in the 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it' philosophy I have come to realize that sometimes even if a treatment is working it is important to change it up once in awhile. The human body will 'get used to' a type of treatment, sometimes to the extent that it will stop working. Therefore, it was in early February that my surgeon decided to switch me from the Calcium Alginate to something called Hydrofera Blue.
Hydrofera Blue is a synthetic sponge that is made of polyvinyl alcohol foam. The foam is infused with two pigments that protect against a wide spectrum of bacteria. The pigments, (Methylene Blue and Gentian Violet) give the hydrofera a blue-ish purple color. What is supposed to happen, is that any drainage will be pulled away from the wound bed, while the pigments are helping to prevent an infection.
The hydrofera blue was working to a certain extent, but after using it for two weeks, my surgeon wanted to change what we were doing again. He changed the orders back to the Prisma dressing with a foam dressing on top. Everything seemed to be going well, except that I was noticing more drainage. At that point, I wasn't sure if it was draining more because, something was wrong or because, the Prisma wasn't holding as much as the hydrofera was. I mentioned it to my nurses but they did not seem overly concerned about it. I was continuing to see my surgeon on a weekly basis throughout this period for the most part. When I woke up the day of my regular appointment with him, again I had a really weird feeling that something wasn't right. In fact, in the car on the way to the wound care center I kept telling my boyfriend that I had a feeling that the appointment wasn't going to go well.
When I got to the appointment I mentioned the excess drainage to the nurse and the surgeon. When the surgeon probed inside the wound I felt pain. I told him that it hurt and he basically asked if I knew what that meant. I did know, it meant that he was poking at bone and that I would need to have yet another surgery. Obviously, I was not at all pleased with this news but, I was not surprised by it due to my incredibly strong feeling. The surgeon told me that someone from his office would be in touch with me so that the surgery could be scheduled. In the meantime, he wanted me to go back to using the hydrofera blue.
When I got home, I called my visiting nurse and explained to her all that had gone on at my appointment and what the wound care orders were. It turns out, that we had run out of the hydrofera, so it would need to be ordered. In the meantime, I got in touch with the nurse at the wound care center and told her that we had Prisma and asked if that would be okay for a few days. I was told that it would be fine. We used the Prisma only until a few days before the surgery while we waited for the hydrofera to be delivered. The surgery was scheduled for the end of March.
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