medical mishap
 

nah, it's not me! about a year ago my daughter's boyfriend had a couple thousand lb piece of oilfield equipment fall on his leg and seperate his calf muscle where you could see daylight thru it. a year later after a couple operations, skin grafts that wouldn't heal and physical therapy, he's almost back 100%. 2 weeks ago he was massaging his scar and noticed something shiny in the edge of his scar. turns out it was a staple they forgot to remove. actually, his therapist removed the staples after his doctors left them in too long and the skin was starting to grow over them. after it started to bother him to much he went to have it checked and sure enough the xray showed it was a staple breaking out of the skin. 1 staple not so bad I guess.. I've had to remove a forgotten stitch or two over the years...but the xray also showed 9 (NINE) more staples deep in muscle tissue that had not been removed also. he's looking at more surgery to have them removed. pretty gross before picture and a pic of the recent xray showing the "forgotten" staples.. medical negligence?

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1354572904.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1354572943.jpg

They sure look like skin staples (not vessel clips). : (

Holy Cow!!! That's a gruesome injury! Hope it all works out.

it ain't pretty but he's walking okay and without a limp. better than I am after a sort of similar injury

Just put a big magnet by his leg and those suckers will fly right out! :eek:

they are supposed to count the staples both times

- call the surgeon

yeah.. someone fkd up. the surgeon didn't even bother to remove the staples from the skin graft and the physical therapist did when he noticed they were still there weeks/months later. this happened in Texas and they moved to La. months ago.

Been in a lot of surgeries...have not witnessed a staple count...instruments, gauze/sponges, needles...mandatory. If something is missing, break out x-ray and look inside before anyone goes anywhere. Staple count? Have never seen that as clips stay behind and staples are visible on the skin.

I'd suspect someone was less than optimally thorough when applying and/or caring for skin grafts (did he have several rounds of skin grafting procedures).

Dude I just finished dinner, a little heads up in the title or something... Spoiler alert -gaping flesh wound :)

supposedly, the staples inside his calf were used to hold the muscle tissue togther as they were putting him back together. one staple was left in the skin graft and was breaking thru the skin 1 yr later. and this prompted the xray which showed the other 9 deep inside.

BTW, when I read medical mishap, I expect to see blood, guts and gore, dead burnt bodies and veins in my teeth. sorry about that

as far as the skin grafts.. yes, he had problems with the graft. dead tissue, skin peeling back etc. he got some kind of settlement from the state for the sub standard procedure or something. not sure of all details. I can get a pic of the healed leg but it's not pretty either