“Open wound healing on leg (Moh's Surgery)?”
My husband had skin cancer surgery on the left leg (Moh's surgery) two months ago. The surgery was successful and is cancer-free and the margins are negative. After two weeks he got a huge infection which is finally stable. Until this week a nurse cleaned the wound daily and changed the dressing. Since this week the surgeon wants the wound only cleaned every second day and he changed the dressing to silicon one. My husband feels much better by now, and the pain is much less than before. We think that the wound healing is progressing but his doctor wants to graft the wound and take the skin from his thigh. We decided not to do it, because we are too afraid, that that wound will not close either. We rather are patient but hope that the wound will close. Our concern is, on the lower left part of the wound is the color yellow. The nurse said it´s a part of the healing process. When I look it up on the computer, it tells me different things. The surgeon said, that part looks a little "dirty" but he only saw a picture. Any advice would be great.
Male | 73 years old
Complaint duration: 2 months
Medications: silicon dressing
Conditions: OPEN WOUND
3 Answers
The yellow color on the wound is likely sloughing, which is part of the healing process as dead tissue sheds. If there’s no increased redness, swelling, or foul odor, it’s usually not a concern. However, if you’re worried, it’s a good idea to follow up with the surgeon or seek a second opinion. Patience and proper wound care are key.
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It's impossible for me to comment with any accuracy from a photograph and particularly from one that is out of focus as this one is. That said, from what I can tell the yellow near the lower part of the wound looks more like normal healing tissue rather than infection.
It difficult to assess from the photo but it appears to be normal protein exudate which forms as it is healing. It will take months for the wound to heal. You should be applying topical antibiotic such as Mupirocin. In the future another option for non melanoma skin cancer is SRT which is a non surgical treatment with 99% success with 5 year follow up.
