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The question is:

Title: What's the proper course of action in case a scab or crust does form over the wound during post-surgery wound care?

I read in the UCLA Dermatology Post-Operative Wound Care Instructions (mirror):

After 24 hours, you may get your wound wet (i.e. take a shower, etc.). At this point you must start changing your wound dressing 2 times a day:

  • a. Carefully remove the old dressing.
  • b. To minimize crusting/scabbing over the wound, cleanse the wound with hydrogen peroxide using cotton swabs. Do not allow a scab or crust to form over the wound.
  • c. Dry the wound with gauze and apply Aquaphor, Vaseline, or Polysporin ointment using cotton swabs.
  • d. Cover with Telfa pads cut to size. If there is any oozing/draining you may also add some gauze cut to size.
  • e. Secure the dressing in place with paper tape.

What's the proper course of action in case a scab or crust does form over the wound in order to optimize cosmesis? Remove ASAP or wait till it gets removed by itself?

All the instructions I have read in other post-surgery wound care guides so far only say apply Vaseline or similar ointment to prevent the formation of scab or crust.

I believe this is a quite general question for improving the cosmetic outcome following wound treatment. It doesn't strike me as a personal medical advice but instead is a generic question on a typical treatment.

Why was the question closed by 1 mod as "requesting personal medical advice"?

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  • 2
    Probably because it asks for personal medical device. What do you expect to be added to that explanation?
    – Bryan Krause Mod
    Commented Nov 24, 2020 at 20:23
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    @BryanKrause this is a general question for improving the cosmetic outcome following wound treatment, therefore it belongs to medical sciences. What makes you think the question is asking for personal advice?
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Nov 24, 2020 at 20:33
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    @FranckDernoncourt In the past month you've asked no fewer than 23 questions about your BCC and its particulars as they pertain to you. You've also tacitly admitted that you've been carefully crafting those questions to skirt site rules prohibiting personal medical advice questions. This question just happened to be egregious enough that two users (not a single mod as you claim) called it for what it is. Feel free to find 5 other users and/or 1 other mod to vote to reopen but I won't be among them.
    – Carey Gregory Mod
    Commented Nov 25, 2020 at 1:18
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    @CareyGregory "You've also tacitly admitted that you've been carefully crafting those questions to skirt site rules prohibiting personal medical advice questions." What? I've never done that. None of my question are seeking personal advice. These are medical science. What makes you think the question is asking for personal advice? There aren't enough high rep users here to find 5 reopeners. But the question already received two reopen votes.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Nov 25, 2020 at 1:39
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    For the same reason as medicalsciences.meta.stackexchange.com/a/1245/7951
    – Chris Rogers
    Commented Nov 28, 2020 at 11:41
  • @ChrisRogers The reason it is not clearly stated. Is it because "Since Oct 19th (3 weeks ago), you have posted 14 questions regarding Basal Cell Carcinoma (BCC)."? I'm genuinely confused about the reason, and this is why I had replied to your answer via comment.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Nov 28, 2020 at 21:05
  • Actually, this q unlike the branded vaseline vs generic one, is not that bad, but I doubt there is enough research on it, from the quick look I had. I don't visit here that often, so I didn't suffer Frank-BCC question overload, but I can see why by the 23q on that the mod and/or the regulars had less tolerance...
    – got trolled too much this week
    Commented Dec 19, 2020 at 22:23
  • @Fizz 23 thanks, SE does have a limit on the number of questions one can post, and I haven't reached it, so I did follow the SE policies: that definitely been a factor when closing questions. Furthermore, millions of individuals are diagnosed with BCC each year so this is an important topic. Lastly, 14 questions within 3 weeks really isn't that much: the issue is that there is nobody on this website (and obviously closing valid questions don't help)
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Dec 19, 2020 at 22:29
  • Well, participants are informed and influenced by prior actions. To give you an imperfect analogy, on Politics SE there's a q close reason, which is probably the most subjective one there, that a q is mainly intended to promote or discredit some cause. And believe it or not there's a regular user from Russia who posts pretty much only negative news about the US, so that you could hardly distinguish them from RT headlines. The q that come with those are usually trivial to answer. And other users over time have developed a faster response/dislike of q coming from that Russian user as result...
    – got trolled too much this week
    Commented Dec 19, 2020 at 22:42
  • @Fizz I see. On medical sciences SE, it makes sense that some users have specialties / specific clinical interests. That helps make content more interesting and expert-level.
    – Franck Dernoncourt
    Commented Dec 19, 2020 at 22:50

1 Answer 1

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Since nobody wrote any answer, I'll answer myself.

I found this post on What constitutes a request for medical advice?, which clearly defines what a request for medical advice is. Quoting former mod anongoodnurse:

The problem is personal medical advice, e.g. "This is my EKG. My doctor wants me to have a catheterization; I don't want one. Should I have the proceedure?" One definition of personal medical advice is an answer that would help only the OP.

When a question seeking personal medical advice is edited to make it on topic (e.g. here), an answer which would be useful to more people, that's fine.

The question What's the proper course of action in case a scab or crust does form over the wound during post-surgery wound care? isn't specific at all to the OP, since not a single piece of information of the OP is given and the question is very generic as it pertains to anyone .

Therefore the question should not have been closed by 1 mod as “personal medical advice”, and should be reopened.

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