? 7/18 Third degree burn (not related to diabetes)

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Kerrie & Winnie

Kerrie & Winnie

Member Since 2015
Does anyone have experience with treatment of a 3rd degree/full thickness thermal burn on a cat (caused by a malfunctioning warming pad used during a dental procedure)? Burn site is now covered with thick eschar and vet is recommending surgical removal to aid skin below to heal. Reuben is stable and comfortable, after many days of pain, and I don't want to subject him to more trauma unnecessarily. Maybe the eschar will come off on its own? Maybe infection will form underneath and it will have to be removed at that point. But are there advantages to removing it now? Does anyone know??
 
Oh my :eek:! I hope the clinic is going to pay for his recovery. Only thing I know about burns is with people, managing pain with Tylenol or Ibuprofen and soothing the skin with aloe or triple antibiotic ointment and covering lightly with gauze. Essentially, trying to keep it clean so it doesn't get infected and manage pain. I would not force the eschar off until you need to or it's ready to come off on it's own.

Hopefully others will chime in :bighug: and Winnie makes a full recovery. She may not grow fur back in that location but she'll still be a cutie :cat:
 
I am beyond words on this one. My only experience is with people too. I would question why the vet feels the way they do. Sometimes for those deep burns they need to keep the dead tissue gone so the new tissue underneath is open to the air to heal better. Otherwise I feel the scabbing is there for a reason - the bodies own defense mechanism.

Did they provide any silver sulfadiazine cream to help with the burn? It helps with deep burns for preventing infections and help with healing. I had it for radiation burns but same concept, it helped heal the burn quicker than some fellow patients that didn't have it.
 
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Gah! These stories break my heart. Being a vet tech, I see and hear of this all the time, and there are so many SAFE alternatives to heating pads! The heat is not circulated through them, and a anesthetized animal is always at risk for thermal burns. :(

I'm so sorry for you baby, and I agree that I hope the vet is covering the costs! That being said; I have actually seen a lot of pets require surgical intervention to remove the dead skin/burned tissue. It can actually improve healing time in a lot of burn victims. Sometimes waiting for infection to occur prior to performing the surgery can make it a bit riskier as the patient now has a decreased immune response. Have they also recommended any type of honey dressing? It sounds weird, but honey is AMAZING for healing wounds!!
 
Thank-you to all of you for your replies! Just wanted to give you an update. It's been a long haul but Reuben is out of the woods. The vet did the surgery (and follow-up care daily for a week afterwards, all at no cost to me), removed the eschar, and stitched the 2 sides of healthy skin together. He was on antibiotics for 10 days and had the stitches removed after 2 weeks. It seems these burns happen a lot more often than you'd think and, if this were to happen to anyone else out there (heaven forbid), for future reference I think getting the dead skin removed was the right thing to do. The fur is starting to grow back now and he's back to his chatty, playful, always hungry self. Thanks again!
 
Kerrie & Winnie said:
Thank-you to all of you for your replies! Just wanted to give you an update. It's been a long haul but Reuben is out of the woods. The vet did the surgery (and follow-up care daily for a week afterwards, all at no cost to me), removed the eschar, and stitched the 2 sides of healthy skin together. He was on antibiotics for 10 days and had the stitches removed after 2 weeks. It seems these burns happen a lot more often than you'd think and, if this were to happen to anyone else out there (heaven forbid), for future reference I think getting the dead skin removed was the right thing to do. The fur is starting to grow back now and he's back to his chatty, playful, always hungry self. Thanks again!
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Great ending to an awful event!:smuggrin:
 
I'm so happy for both of you but there's another issue here. Did the heating pad just go bonkers all at once or was everyone in the room too stupid to smell a burning cat? I'm not talking about vengeance and lawyers, that solves nothing but the company that made the pad has to be made aware and if it's a surgical type pad the state vet board should know. I am NOT a lawyer! Your vet should also write a letter to Reuben and then you can frame it.
Side note story. I bought some Logitech computer speakers and the AC adapter melted into the power bar. I showed it at the fire hall. They just took one look and said "Counterfeit". Scary thought isn't it?
 
So glad things turned out for the best!!

Noah & me said:
I'm so happy for both of you but there's another issue here. Did the heating pad just go bonkers all at once or was everyone in the room too stupid to smell a burning cat? I'm not talking about vengeance and lawyers, that solves nothing but the company that made the pad has to be made aware and if it's a surgical type pad the state vet board should know. I am NOT a lawyer! Your vet should also write a letter to Reuben and then you can frame it.
Side note story. I bought some Logitech computer speakers and the AC adapter melted into the power bar. I showed it at the fire hall. They just took one look and said "Counterfeit". Scary thought isn't it?
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It doesn't quite work that way with heating pad burns - there would be no smell, or evidence it was occuring until after the fact (like sunburn).

Unfortunately, it's not on the fault of the heating pad or company. Heating pads are frowned upon in veterinary medicine because they do not circulate heat in a safe way. If a patient is anesthetized or too sick to move; it's very easy for them to get burned on something like a heated table or pad.

Instead, the clinic I work for uses warm water pads that circulate warm water - much less likely for burns. Even safer, we use special warm air blankets that completely irradicate the chances of thermal burns.

Glad it ended well, but I've heard stories like this where that wasn't the case :(
 
My bad. I wasn't trying to be vengeful, just wanted to make sure it didn't happen again. Like the time I was trying, with both arms full, to open a gate and dribbled hot coffee on my dog. What a putz!
 
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