An answer for Miss Urban's 6th period class who asked "What is Hydrotherapy and does it hurt?"
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Jan 10, 2009
Hydrotherapy means the use of warm water, both during immersion in a tub, and in showers with running water. Hydrotherapy as a mode of treatment for burns has the following purposes:
to enhance desloughing and to clean the wound surface
to drain pus and to help debride dead tissue
to alter microbial flora
to enhance healthy tissue formation and healing
to facilitate physical therapy
to comfort and psychologically uplift the patient
In Honey's case, we typically put her in a tub and use a faucet with a hose attachment to gently apply water to the affected areas , especially her back and front paw where there is a lot of damage. Her two most damaged paws are kept bandaged during the day, so this gives them a chance to air out, get cleaned up and promotes tissue growth. We give her a mild sedative so that she is as comfortable as possible. We run the water on all of these areas for a few minutes and to make them as clean as possible. When we are done we apply Silver Sulfadine, which is a medication used to treat and prevent infections associated with burns. We then reapply clean bandages and she is good to go until the next day when we repeat the process.
