arm
fistula
mepiform
plastic surgery
scar
scar management
scar removal
scar revision
silicone
silicone sheets
silicone strips
stitches
stomach scar
surgeon
surgery
vitamin e oil
Scar management
September 29, 2013
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So now that I’ve had all of these medical procedures (haha), I’m going to be left with some scars. Before getting my stitches out, I looked up different types of scar management options. Vitamin E oil got VERY mixed reviews. When I went to get my stitches out the other day, they tried to sell me a small container of vitamin E cream for $18. I didn’t feel the value was very good at ALL, so I decided to go with an option I found online at well.ca- silicone strips.
These strips seemed to come pretty highly recommended, especially for post-op scars. They also came highly recommended for older scars. I’m going to try them out for a few weeks then report back on how my scar looks.
The box comes with 5 sheets of silicone that can be cut to size. Here is one of the sheets. It has air bubbles in it. It didn’t when I first opened the package a day ago, but when I took it out of the package to put it on, my hands were wet, so perhaps my wet hands caused the bumps/bubbles.
These strips are applied to the scar/properly healed wound and they remain there for 7 days. They apparently will stay on in the shower. Each of these 5 sheets are 10 x 18 cm (or 4 x 7 in). The good thing is that these sheets can be cut to size, which is what I did in the picture below. I trimmed off a small rectangular strip long enough to cover my scar and that was it.
Scar therapy via theses silicon strips doesn’t come cheap, though. The box of 5 sheets cost me $99.99. As someone who is prone to keloid-y scar formations, I’m hoping that these Mepiform silicon strips/sheets will do the trick for my scar revision scar. When my fistula removal scar has healed up, the steri strips fall off, and the stitches dissolve, I’ll be using them on my arm too.
These strips are flesh coloured! Unfortunately, not the colour of my flesh! Haha. But I won’t be showing my stomach all over the place (especially at this time of the year) and I really don’t care if they are visible on my arm either.
Will post an update of my stomach scar before scar therapy and with regular updates.
Stay tuned.
Hi Miz Flow, My name is Sarah and I have been on dialysis for three years as of last Monday, the 1st. I have some pretty gnarly scars from a decimated fistula on my left arm (I have a working one in my right with no where near the nasty scarring, thanks to a different -amazing- surgeon). I have considered getting these silicone sheets for my left arm as well as some small scars on my chest & neck from four different dialysis catheters.
I was just wondering how the sheets were working for you (I know you haven't been at it long).
Thanks!
Hi Sarah!
Thanks for your message! I gotta be honest-it is entirely too early for me to make any kind of an assessment in terms of scar improvement with the silicone strips on my stomach or my arm. For my arm, I'm only using them on a small section because the scar because the scar from the fistula removal isn't healed enough yet for me to apply the strips. But I so promise to keep up with the updates and hopefully they work well.
Hang in there, Sarah! And I hope to report back with good news 🙂
Xo