What to do when you get burned

[Backwoods Savage]

Reading another thread prompted me to start this one about what to do if your hand (or other part of your body) gets burned from the stove or something else.

I feel that probably most will say they use aloe to put on a burn, and it is good.

Please allow me to pass on a little story from something that happened many, many moons ago while visiting Alaska. Mid August and we (two couples) were camping out in a tent. We liked to froze one night and when we got up (early) then next morning I quickly started a fire. We all huddled around it while the coffee was getting hot. btw, our water bucket had 1" of ice on top!

After pouring everyone a cup of coffee, I then sat the coffee pot down by the fire to keep it warm. We all still huddled close to the fire and it was great. However, in my clumsy mode, I suddenly bumped a log and it in turn bumped the coffee pot which in turn spilled right on my wife's foot. Ouch!

I quickly broke out the medicine chest while she removed sandal and sock. Man, that foot was all extremely red. I commenced to putting Vitamin E on the burn. I really put it on thick too. Naturally there were some blisters formed before the E was put on. However, she has no scars to this day. She was able to put a loose fitting sock on that afternoon and the very next day was able to wear shoes!

Therefore, my vote for burns is to put Vitamin E on as quickly as possible. Aloe is good, but we just feel Vitamin E is better.

We also put Vitamin E on another person who burnen their leg on the muffler of a dirt bike. All was well.


Let's hear from others what they feel works.

 

[JohnnyBravo]

i usualy swear and hold my cold beer up to the burn. if the beer is not cold (or i don;t have one) its time for a new one anyway. also have this huge aloe plant in the kitchen.

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Johnny, a bad burn does tend to bring out a different vocabulary at times....

 

[drizler]

I just tried the vitamin E thing on a burn I got on the side of my wrist from a lawnmower muffler last summer. Wow I put some on a couple times and I swear it never bothered me a bit, in fact I sort of forgot about it being there. The skin never fell off no scab nothing but a tad of darker skin, not even a real scar. The hair even grew back as before to the extent that I can't really locate the spot since it happened in July. As for the beer theory it takes either more beer later or less beer prior. The dosage is the hard part to calculate.

 

[hookspacken]

Funny you bringthis topic up. Lastnight I was loading the stove for overnight and my finger was closer tothe stove handle than I thought, and OUCH I used aloe and was good in a couple minutes. Never tried the Vitamin E, but will kepp it in mind for the next time as I am sure it wont be all that long before it happens again.

 

[gpcollen1]

Sometimes it is hard to tell what the result may have been had you not done XXX. ME working on my own cars, cooking, camping and burning wood has yielded a few burn opportunities. I use cold water immediately and then either Vit E or Aloe for follow up depending on how bad. I do not know what is better really...

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Just a quick note: You can buy Vitamin E in a bottle or even in the little pill form. On our Alaskan trip we had the pills (get the largest ones if you buy any) and I just poked the end with a needle and squeezed out the E. It worked!

 

[MrGriz]

I'll have to try the vitamin E next time (oh and there will be a next time). It sounds more effective than swearing and drinking to dull the pain, which is my current method.

 

[kd460]

For small burns like your finger tip, simply rub the finger on an oily part of your body like behind the ear. The pain will be gone in a matter of minutes. Works really well. KD

 

[Backwoods Savage]

Griz, give up the swearing but not the drinking! Well, if it get too bad, a few cuss words sometimes help also.

 

[woodconvert]

Heh, my stove is a top loader so my forearms (yeah, right where the welding glove stops) have quite a few dark crescents on them from the lip of the stove. I get asked about them a lot. It kind of looks like some kind of fraternity initiation or something. I don't usually put anything on them and they heal over quick...as they are cauterized.

 

[WarmGuy]

I worked in a kitchen once, and here's the trick that most people do not know:

Immediately take a max dose of aspirin (or Advil, Tylenol, etc.). When people get a headache they think of these general anesthetics, but not when they get a burn.

Also, if possible put the burned area of skin in a bowl of cold water. If you're lucky, you can keep it there until the aspirin kicks in.

 

[EddyKilowatt]

I've never done a controlled experiment with two identical cuts and one gets E and the other doesn't... but it has seemed to me that cuts and scrapes that I've put E on (also by pricking the end of an E capsule) have healed more quickly and with less scarring. I've never tried it on burns, but maybe I will.

When I had an old Morso end-loading non-EPA stove, I seldom had burns. When I switched to a modern side-loading EPA stove with baffles and secondary air tubes, it took me awhile to appreciate that those parts are always branding-iron HOT... no warnings... any contact at all and it's not just an "ouch" like you get in the kitchen, but a dead patch of white skin leading to a sore that takes a couple of weeks to heal.

That's where the vitamin E would come in I guess... but I made myself an ironclad rule that I don't ever open the stove door for any reason unless I've got a leather glove on my hand and a heavy cotton sleeve over my forearm. Not to sound smug but at this point I wouldn't need the E... a little prevention seems to go a long way, at least in my firing situation and with my small stove.

Eddy