Is there a Dr in the house? Glass in foot

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Well several days ago I stepped on a small (I thought) piece of glass. I pulled out a tiny sliver from my heel and thought that was that. It was just a splinter size piece. It still hurt when I put weight on it but I thought that was because I had stepped on the glass in the first place. It didn't bleed at all when it happened, maybe a drop of blood but that's all.

Now it's been hurting worse every day and today I can't even walk on it except in my tennis shoes where my feet turn in anyway so the part where it's hurt doesn't get any pressure. Barefooted, I have to walk on my toes on that foot. It hurts to even touch it.

It doesn't seem infected, it's not warm or red. I cannot see a spot where there could be something in there at the surface and there is no cut or abrasion of any sort. It's slightly hard and swollen where the piece was, but it feels like it's deeper inside. It actually feels like there is a small piece broken off up inside there and the skin has healed up over it because it was such a small hole.

I'm soaking it in hot salt water now, but that's really all I know to do. I don't want to go to the ER about it, because it's not an emergency and I can just walk on my toes on that foot, but I won't be able to see my doctor until Friday. I also don't want to go to the ER because I think they may numb it and cut it open to get out whatever is in there, or at least look for it, and 1) they don't give prescriptions for pain meds at the ER here in town because of so many people drug seeking and 2) I couldn't afford to get it filled even if they did. I know it would hurt really bad when the local that they would use wore off, so at the moment I'm just sort of looking for some kind of home remidies or advice.

_________________
I'm giving it another shot. We will see.
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Doctor time!

Please seek out an appropriately trained and licensed medical professional to have this treated.

Yeah, if it still hurts after you pull the splinter out, there's still a splinter in it, and the thing with glass is, by nature it'll just keep going deeper and deeper. The Nazis even experimented with glass landmines for this reason in WWII, just because of how hellish the injuries would be, because the pieces would never settle in one place like a metal splinter would. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glasmine_43

Anyway, you gotta find the "hole" where the glass went in, and pull the glass out. In your case, a doctor would make life a bit easier, as he's going to have to make the hole bigger to find the little piece of glass. If you got good tweezers, you can try harder pulling it out by basically squeezing the skin to get the glass to go the opposite direction, or possibly, get a needle and fish it out. Basically, the thing with splinters is, you gotta try hard as hell to get them out, even if it takes a long while, or else they just go deeper or get infected. So, might actually wanna see a doctor about this, unless you like doing basically self surgery with an exacto knife.

From what you describe, this is not a do-it-yourself project. See the doctor before things take a really bad turn for the worse, and yes, go to emergency, if you can't convince your regular doc to take you right away. This is an emergency! Not all emergencies are bullet wounds, traffic accidents, appendicitis, etc. Some are less severe, but still emergencies. That's what your case is, so don't wait to get help, go NOW!

As for money to pay for any medical help, hospitals will let you make installment payments if you can't pay the full price up front, and many hospitals have their own charity care plans, or know of others that they can direct you to, if you are really hard up. These programs will help you with payments.

So don't wait--get help NOW!

I got it out!

Here is what I did. Somebody told me to soak it in hot salt water, so I did that for about an hour, hour and a half, adding more hot water and salt as needed. My feet are pretty hard on the bottom because I go barefooted a lot so this softened it up really well.

I got my reading glasses and sat under a bright light and looked at it really closely and I could see where it went in. The bottom of my foot was all soft and moist and pink so I was able to see it then. I got some nail clippers and a pin and poked and poked and dug and dug but I got it out.

Yay!

It was really small and in there pretty good, and the area bled well so I washed it and put a bandaid and Neosporin on. I can walk on it now and it doesn't hurt at all. I don't think I would have been able to see the spot or get to it without all that soaking, and I hear that the salt will draw things to the surface too. Even when I'm right out of the shower and my feet were clean, I couldn't see the spot because of how hard they are from not wearing shoes. The soaking is what made it possible to do that.

Thanks for the concern and the advice. If I hadn't been able to get it out myself tonight, I would have gone to the ER tomorrow I'm sure. It was hurting worse every day. It didn't really hurt to dig and poke as much as it hurt to put pressure on it.

_________________
I'm giving it another shot. We will see.
My forum is still there and everyone is welcome to come join as well. There is a private women only subforum there if anyone is interested. Also, there is no CAPTCHA.

The link to the forum is http://www.rightplanet.proboards.com

Yay!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwNOmS78q-o[/youtube]

Here's a track for you, OOM. Hope you foot feels better.

Yay for you using my advice sorta. I feel useful.