Bernie Michalik's posterous site

On Friday night, I dropped a heavy object on my hand, causing the skin on
my ring finger to split open and tissue to come out of the opening. Not
something you can just put a bandage on a have it get better.

What did I learn from this?

You need to get a deep cut or bad wound treated right away. After 12 hours,
the doctor said, you should not get stitches due to infection. Don't put it
off like I did: go right away.

Know where you nearest hospital is. I didn't. I talked to someone who said:
you should go to Sunnybrook. That hospital didn't even occur to me until
they mentioned it.

In Ontario, bring your health card.

If you are in not in really bad shape, you are going to have to wait. Treat
it like a trip. Bring snacks, reading material, maybe even a light blanket
or pillow. My hand was stable and I was in no danger, so the triage nurses
wisely decided I could wait. I am good with that. And between my Blackberry
and the stuff I brought to read, I was ok.

Ask the doctor if they can freeze it first. Mine cleaned it then froze it.
The cleaning hurt! Don't make it hurt any more than it has to.

Nurses in hospitals in Toronto are good at moving you along so that it
feels like you are getting somewhere. You go from the outer waiting room to
the inner waiting room to the treatment area. The whole process took around
3 hours, but the time seemed to go by fast.

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Sent from my BlackBerry Handheld.