Dressing at the Polyclinic

Yesterday, I made my first trip to the polyclinic for my dressing treatment.

Negotiating down a couple of flights of stairs on a pair of crutches from where I live to the lift-lobby storey took a while. I am still not too good with crutches, but I suppose that will require time and more experience. Once my parents and I were downstairs, we flagged a cab, and took a ride to the polyclinic.

Waiting time was quite short (about 15 minutes) because I had a referral letter from the hospital and was hence directed straight to the waiting area outside the dressing room. When my number was called, I went in. My parents waited outside...which was good because the dressing treatment was a painful affair, and I didn't want them to see me in a state of tears.

The nurses in the dressing room were very understanding and kept telling me to relax. But I found that I couldn't. The pain which I had experienced in hospital seemed to have left a deep scar in my memory, and I began to tense up the moment I saw one of the nurses bring out the tray with the bottle of antiseptic liquid, pincers, gauze and bandages. They suggested many ideas for me to relax, including singing to myself, thinking positive thoughts, counting to 100, imagining my girlfriend was with me etc. I tried the singing, and buried my face under my cap and waistpouch. I couldn't bring myself to see what the nurses would do to me.

The procedure seemed to take forever. The nurse in charge of my dressing had to stop several times because she couldn't bear to continue when she saw that I was in such a state of distress. She poured more liquid into the small cavity in my thigh, and allowed the gauze (which had been stuffed inside the cavity the previous day and which had been soaked with body fluids released by the raw flesh in the cavity) to soften further for easier removal. Each time she started again to dig out the old gauze with her pincers, I could feel the metal prodding against the raw flesh in my thigh, and gosh, did the tears stream down my face!

Eventually, the dressing procedure was over. It was less painful than the previous two occasions (in hospital), but took far longer to complete. I cannot imagine having to do this every day until my wound recovers...