blister piercing

[Maura Santangelo]

I have become a believer in blister piercing though I was convinced that this
was very bad practice.  My husband became the guinea pig when he was unable
to walk because of a blister and i performed the surgery, though he had an
opportunity to do the same for me a few days later. We had come without a
surgical kit, so  I used a regular sewing needle and white cotton thread
bought at the grocery store in Zubiri.  the surgery was simple: clean skin
with betadine or equivalent, squeeze blister so that it becomes more raised
and avoid being too deep, put needle with thread through blister, trim ends,
cover with bandage.  I removed the thread the next day as I did not want to
walk on it.  I kept a band aid on it for another day of walking.  12 hours of
leaving the thread in place seemed sufficient to form a fistula (opening in
skin which does not heal) so that fluid did not reaccumulate.  We used
vaseline on our feet after that without recurrence of blisters.  We were both
able to walk without pain the next day. Eventually the skin sloughs off.

In our small series of 5 blisters in 3 patients we had 100% success without
any complications...(I'd like to see those statistics in my glaucoma
surgery).  But would be interested to hear other people's experience,
especially non piercers, especially as regards to length of 'disability,
pain', perhaps we could collect a longer series...

>
> Anyone care to open up a discussion on the relative merits of piercing/not
> piercing blisters?
>
>
> kind regards
>
> Jeffrey
>
>