Splinter Removal in Detroit

Splinter Removal in Detroit

We are a group of family medicine doctors. Our practice, Plum Health DPC, addresses a wide variety of concerns, like splinters that get stuck in fingers when doing house work. This week, one of our patients got a splinter in his finger while doing some woodworking around the house. It was painful and causing a slight infection to the surrounding tissue.

We used an 18 gauge needle to work the splinter out of the finger. It took about 2 minutes to perform the procedure, but the patient felt immediate relief. Some pus drained out of the wound during the procedure. We always review Tetanus, diphtheria, and acellular pertussis TDaP vaccine history in these instances and get our patients up-to-date on that TDaP vaccine. The risk of getting tetanus through a splinter like this is very low, but it’s good to check the vaccine history and reasonable to update folks who are more than 5 years since their last TDaP vaccine with the TDaP shot.

Thanks for reading and have a wonderful day.

-Dr. Paul Thomas, Physician with Plum Health DPC