Once the pus has been removed, the cavity needs to heal upwards from the inside out, so the opening in your skin is left open. If the cavity is deep, your surgeon will place a pack (antiseptic dressing) in it to keep it open, allowing pus to drain out and your wound to heal properly.
Cover the wound with a clean dry dressing. Change the dressing if it becomes soaked with blood or pus. If a gauze packing was placed inside the abscess pocket, you may be told to remove it yourself. You may do this in the shower.
If you don't get a skin abscess drained, it can continue to grow and fill with pus until it bursts. A burst abscess can be very painful and cause the infection to spread. Treatment for tooth and other mouth abscesses is especially important. Untreated tooth abscesses can kill you.
Extra phosphorus causes body changes that pull calcium out of your bones, making them weak. High phosphorus and calcium levels also lead to dangerous calcium deposits in blood vessels, lungs, eyes, and heart. Over time this can lead to increased risk of heart attack, stroke or death.
Pus is a sign that a wound is infected but it is also a sign that your body is trying to fight the infection and heal the injury. Once an infection has started, your immune system begins trying to fight it off. It sends white blood cells to the area to destroy the bacteria.
This can worsen your infection. If your abscess won't open and drain on its own, you'll need the help of your provider to open it. You shouldn't attempt to drain multiple abscesses at the same time. It's often too painful to drain them all at once.
If you have purulent discharge or other symptoms of infection, you will need treatment so that it doesn't get worse. Your doctor may need to clean the wound and apply new dressings. They can rinse the site with an antibiotic solution if the infection is small.
Discharge - If the wound is discharging small amounts of pus, it is a positive sign of healing. However, if there is continuous drainage and you start noticing bad odor or have discoloration, the wound is likely infected.
A wound that's healing can produce a clear or pink fluid. An infected wound can produce a yellowish, bad-smelling fluid called pus. When fluid seeps from a wound, it is called wound drainage.
What to Expect: Pain and swelling normally peak on day 2. Any redness should go away by day 4. Complete healing should occur by day 10.
Abscess-Drainage Procedure
Once located, the abscess is typically drained with an aspiration needle but, because it is likely to refill, surgery, which is performed under general anesthesia, is usually also necessary. In either case, abscess drainage requires a complete elimination of the infected material.
Serosanguineous drainage should last for a few days because it's part of the normal wound-healing process. Beyond that, drainage may be cause for concern.
Infected cuts and scrapes heal much more slowly than those kept clean and infection-free. One of the best ointments to treat infection is NEOSPORIN® — the #1 doctor recommended brand of topical antibiotic in the US.
A small skin abscess may drain naturally, or simply shrink, dry up and disappear without any treatment. Larger abscesses may need to be treated with antibiotics to clear the infection. The pus may need to be drained.
Green pus is a potential warning sign of a pseudomonas bacterial infection caused by a bacterium called Pseudomonas aeruginosa. This color of pus is often accompanied by a foul odor. Yellow pus. A possible indicator of a staph infection or strep. Brown pus.
However, antibiotics alone may not be enough to clear a skin abscess, and the pus may need to be drained to clear the infection. If a skin abscess is not drained, it may continue to grow and fill with pus until it bursts, which can be painful and can cause the infection to spread or come back.
Do not let your wound dry out. This could damage the delicate new cells that are growing. Cleaning your hands and the surrounding skin with mild soap and warm water is usually enough. A daily shower with all bandages removed will help prevent buildup of debris that would harbor the growth of more bacteria.
Unlike other infections, antibiotics alone will not usually cure an abscess. In general an abscess must open and drain in order for it to improve. Sometimes draining occurs on its own, but generally it must be opened with the help of a warm compress or by a doctor in a procedure called incision and drainage (I&D).
There are four stages of wound healing - Hemostasis, inflammatory, proliferation, and maturation.
“A wound that's oozing pus definitely means you have a bacterial infection,” said Dr. Brady Didion, a Marshfield Clinic Health System family medicine physician. An incision or wound that's healing well looks slightly red and may seep clear fluid. An infected wound may ooze whitish, yellowish or greenish pus.
Pus is an exudate, typically white-yellow, yellow, or yellow-brown, formed at the site of inflammation during bacterial or fungal infection.