How to Treat Infected Wounds At Home: 6 Tips
Advice on how to treat infected wounds at home is fairly straightforward. When you know the “why” behind treating an infected wound, care becomes much less overwhelming. Understanding how your body repairs and replaces cells can also help you manage care immediately after a wound happens.
When you know why you need to use a bandage, for example, knowing when to change the bandage is much easier! Taking proper care of a wound can help a minor infection heal quickly, or even prevent a wound from developing an infection in the first place.
Most people will be able to care for their wounds at home, but this isn’t always the case. If you have a severely infected wound, you’ll need to get help from a medical professional for healing. These tips can still be helpful, but you may need additional care.
But how to treat infected wounds at home and how to know when to call for help are two different things. Let’s take a look at both, as well as some general tips for wound healing.
How to care for wounds
Anytime you get a wound, your body jumps to start the healing process. Before you’re even thinking about how to treat infected wounds at home, your body is already working to prevent an infection!
You can help by gently holding pressure with a clean paper towel or tea towel to stop the bleeding. Once your body has formed a clot, gently wash the wound with mild soap and water. Then, put a bandage on to protect it.
The bandage should be changed daily for about a week and then removed. When changing the bandage, you can look for signs of an infected wound. You can also repeat the process of using a mild soap to clean the site of the wound and then gently patting it dry.
While an antibiotic ointment is a cornerstone of how to treat infected wounds at home, it isn’t as important in general wound care. Unless your wound is infected, there’s no need to use antibiotics. Using them when they aren’t needed can cause antibiotic resistance, and occasionally a painful skin condition called contact dermatitis.
Instead, use plain petroleum jelly to keep the wound moist beneath the bandage. You can also use this to moisturize the site of the wound after you’ve removed the bandage.
But how can you tell when an antibiotic ointment is needed? What if your wound really is infected?
How to tell if a wound is infected
There are a few signs to look out for when you’re trying to figure out whether you’re treating an infected wound. And the first step in how to treat infected wounds at home is really determining whether the wound is actually infected!
A slow-healing wound may be a sign of infection, but there are several slow-healing wounds causes that are unrelated to infection, as well. Rather than focus on how long your wound is taking to heal, look for symptoms of infection.
Pus, or yellowish fluid leaking from the wound is a clear sign that the wound is infected. However, a normally-healing wound may have some fluid draining, as well. The color and consistency will help you tell the difference.
Normal drainage will be watery and clear or very pale yellow. This fluid helps to transport proteins and antibodies to the site of the wound and is nothing to be concerned about.
Pus can be milky, cloudy, and thick, and may be yellow, green, gray, or brown. This drainage also typically has a very unpleasant smell, since it’s carrying dead cells and bacteria.
Other signs of an infected wound include:
- A wound that is warm or hot to the touch
- Red or brown streaks in the skin around the wound
- Intense pain on or around the wound
- Feeling feverish or developing a fever
Any of these can be a sign that your wound is infected. Let’s look at some of the best tips for how to treat infected wounds at home, so you’re prepared if your wound starts showing these symptoms.
When to see a doctor about an infected wound
Any time you think your wound is infected, visiting a doctor is a good idea. Your doctor can give you advice on how to treat infected wounds at home that are specific to your wound and medical history.
If your symptoms include red or brown streaks on the skin around the wound, a fever, or if your wound smells bad, seek medical care immediately. You should also visit an emergency room if you lose feeling in or around the wound, or if your skin turns yellow, black, or blue.
How to treat infected wounds at home
When you’re learning how to treat infected wounds or how to care for any wound, oxygen is key. Wound care at home usually won’t include any kind of oxygen therapy, but your body still needs oxygen for healing.
Even when you don’t have a wound, your body uses oxygen to repair damaged cells and replace old ones. Your body also uses oxygen in the process of creating collagen, a strong, stretchy protein that’s found in all tissues throughout your body.
Collagen is a big part of healing wounds, since it’s so central to your skin and muscle tissue, and your body needs oxygen to form it. So what does this tell us about how to treat infected wounds at home or how to prevent infection?
Oxygen and collagen’s roles in wound healing tell us that bacteria are only part of the challenge. Treating an infected wound means watching out for a few things – both inside and outside your body. Let’s review some of them.
Keep the wound clean
Of course, first and foremost, you want to keep that wound clean. This will help remove the bacteria and dead cells your body is struggling to fight off on its own.
Many people grew up thinking they needed to use hydrogen peroxide or rubbing alcohol to “clean out” a wound. While both are great at killing bacteria, they’re a little too good at their job. Both hydrogen peroxide and rubbing alcohol can severely damage the sensitive tissues in and around your wound. This means they can slow or even prevent healing.
When it comes to how to treat infected wounds at home, a mild soap and warm water will do the trick. These will clean out the bacteria without damaging any healthy tissue, and you can continue with them unless a doctor prescribes otherwise.
Change the bandage regularly
Bandages are an ongoing part of how to treat infected wounds at home. Whether your wound is infected or not, your bandage should be breathable and changed regularly. A bandage that isn’t breathable or doesn’t get changed creates a low-oxygen environment.
This moist, low-oxygen environment is exactly the place bacteria – the kind that causes infections – thrive. This makes your wound site more friendly to the bacteria and less friendly to your body’s natural healing processes.
Changing the bandage allows you to watch for signs of a healing wound, or monitor any worsening symptoms. Regular adhesive bandages and gauze are essential to have on hand when you’re working on how to treat infected wounds at home.
For infected wounds, you should work with a healthcare professional to determine when the wound no longer needs a bandage. The length of time you’ll need to keep it bandaged depends on the severity of the infection and how responsive it is to treatment, such as antibiotics.
Use an antibiotic ointment
An over-the-counter antibiotic ointment is typically all you need for a minor infection or wound. Once you have signs that the wound is infected, you can start applying this instead of petroleum jelly to keep your wound moist after changing the bandage.
The antibiotic ointment will help to kill off the bacteria causing the infection. In a wound that isn’t infected, your body can keep the bacteria out and kill them off using antibodies. There are some cases, though, where those antibodies aren’t strong enough. Antibiotic ointments fill in the gaps, so the bacteria can’t take over.
Antibiotic ointment is another thing that may come to mind pretty quickly when you think of how to treat infected wounds at home. Unlike hydrogen peroxide or rubbing alcohol, though, this can actually help with treating an infected wound!
Manage your pain
Infected wounds can be painful. Depending on the severity of the infection, you may only feel pain at the site of the wound. In other cases, you might be dealing with pain throughout your body from a fever or more severe infection.
Either way, managing pain is an important part of how to treat infected wounds at home. Pain management will help you rest, which is essential to the healing process.
Most antibiotic ointments will have a mild painkiller in them, as well. You can also take oral pain relievers, like ibuprofen or acetaminophen. Intensely painful wounds may also call for a stronger painkiller, which a doctor can prescribe if needed.
You can also use dressings and bandages with a weak adhesive or no adhesive to reduce pain while keeping your wound clean. Remember, changing your dressing is an incredibly important part of how to treat infected wounds at home!
Know and watch for a normal wound-healing timeline
Typically, your wound will heal in about 3 or 4 weeks. You should see significant improvement in the wound within about 2 weeks. Of course, these are for normally healing wounds. Once you realize you have a wound not healing, you’ll need to get to the bottom of why. Slow-healing wounds can be caused by age, health conditions, or lifestyle factors like smoking.
Infection can also cause a wound to heal more slowly, but slow healing is typically not the only sign of infection. Once you see another sign, it’s important to use some of the tips for how to treat infected wounds at home to make sure you can nip it in the bud.
Very mild infections shouldn’t delay the timeline of healing too much and should get back on track with treatment. Severe infections may require medical intervention or a longer timeline to heal.
If you have any concerns, follow up with a healthcare professional for accurate healing timelines. They’ll let you know how to treat infected wounds at home, and how much treatment you’ll need from a professional.
Eat well to support wound healing
Finally, remember that your body can’t make something out of nothing. Your body is hard at work to repair and replace the cells that were damaged by the wound and the tissue. You can support this healing by eating to support wound healing.
Diet can be a hugely helpful piece of how to treat infected wounds at home. Remember how important oxygen is in wound healing? Your body uses red blood cells to transport oxygen, so eating foods that support red blood cells can also support wound healing! Iron-rich foods like red meat, leafy greens, and lentils are perfect for this.
Your body is also using collagen to build and repair itself, as we mentioned earlier. What you might not know is that you can also find foods rich in collagen to support wound healing – like bone broth. On its own, though, collagen can be difficult to absorb. This means your body can’t fully access the nutrients in the collagen you’re eating.
Collagen wound healing supplements will contain collagen peptides. These are collagen proteins that have been broken down so your body can access all the nutrients it needs for healing. When choosing a wound healing supplement, you’ll want to look for something that’s medical-grade and free from common filler ingredients.
A high-quality protein is an overlooked aspect of how to treat infected wounds at home. Protein is an essential part of every cell in your body. Of course, your body needs it to heal wounds!
Caring for wounds as they heal
Learning how to treat infected wounds at home isn’t difficult. Your body will need a little extra attention and care while it heals, especially after an infection.
Treating an infected wound can usually be done from home, but sometimes the attention you need is from a professional. Any wound showing signs of infection should be examined by a doctor to rule out potentially serious conditions.
Once cleared, you can keep the wound clean with soap and water. Then, use clean, breathable bandages to dress the wound, changing them regularly to prevent further infection. Antibiotic ointment and painkillers are also key in how to treat infected wounds at home, but should always be started with your doctor’s recommendation.
Last, but certainly not least, give your body the materials it needs to heal. Iron-rich foods will support your red blood cells in transporting needed oxygen to the site of your wound. Medical-grade collagen protein peptides have all the materials your body needs to build and repair cells, putting you on the path to healing.
