Best band-aid ever?
January 29, 2006 4:17 PM   Subscribe

What is the best band-aid ever? (In terms of effectiveness, not-falling-off-ness, etc)
posted by sdis to Health & Fitness (16 answers total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
The band-aid sport strips, the ones with the padded foam strip part, really don't come off until the point at which you want them off and then you can take them off, sort of excellent in my book.
posted by jessamyn at 4:32 PM on January 29, 2006


Duct tape. I cut my foot pretty good one time and my friend recommended sealing it up with duct tape. I told him he was crazy, but I was intrigued. So I tried it. And it worked like a charm. It will not fall off.
posted by jasondigitized at 4:45 PM on January 29, 2006


Big wound or small wound? For small wounds, I think stuff like New-Skin (which you basically paint on to the wound) is pretty hard to beat. I think there are several alternatives now that use the same idea.
posted by BrandonAbell at 5:00 PM on January 29, 2006


I really like Nexcare Waterproof bandages. They stay on really well, even in places that are tricky (fingers, toes, other bendy joints) and they stay put in water. Bonus, they are discreet- I won't say that they are invisible, but they are very unobtrusive. And they aren't horribly painful to remove, either.
posted by ambrosia at 5:58 PM on January 29, 2006


I'm cuckoo for Tegaderm, from 3M/Nexcare, a clear plastic cover for biggish scrapes. I use it on road rash and it's really marvelous at preventing scars. It comes in pretty big pieces and you leave it on for several days -- up to a week. Any oozing pus collects in a little bubble. As I understand (and have experienced) it, the Tegaderm simulates the skin that you have lost, letting new skin grow back in a fairly skinnish environment. Maybe not so useful on cuts, but second to none on scrapes (where a band-aid pad would dry out and increase scarring, and where New-Skin thins out too much, and also, IMO, creates more scarring). Ambrosia's Nexcare Waterproof bandages use Tegaderm for their adhesive -- but those have gauze padding, where tegaderm is just the clear plastic. Obviously tegaderm doesn't stick to the wound, but is waterproof.

I've also sometimes used Band-Aid Advanced Healing/Activ-Flex bandages for large areas, but the problem with these is that they are designed to react with pus and ooze to create a white gel padding, and in my experience this padding always gets too big and ends up peeling the bandage off at the edges.
posted by xueexueg at 6:10 PM on January 29, 2006


I always just use medical tape with some padding underneath. That only works well for the fingers, though.
posted by borkingchikapa at 6:14 PM on January 29, 2006


A second reccomend for NewSkin - Stings like merry hell going on, but is waterproof, unrestrictive and unincumbering - It's strong enough to let you maintain full mobility even with fairly deep cuts(@5mm or so - If it's a lot deeper than that, maybe stitches are in order?), which means that the scar tissue that forms is stronger. (In my experience - And I've had more experience with this than I want to really think about.)

I've tried 3M's Nex-Care, as well. It didn't sting, but it also cost more, was less strong/effective, and was more difficult to apply.
posted by Orb2069 at 6:15 PM on January 29, 2006


I'll take Skin Shield over NewSkin -- it's way more resilient and less likely to peel or flake off. Still stings though.
posted by jjg at 8:22 PM on January 29, 2006


I've heard several stories about and personally know one person who was patched up with superglue. Apparently it is an accepted practice, but I wouldn't really recommend performing it on yourself, unless you're bleeding to death I guess.
posted by TheOnlyCoolTim at 8:41 PM on January 29, 2006


Another for duct tape. I split my shin wide open while canoeing. A bit of vodka to cleanse the wound, and a judicious shave of the calf to make removal less painful, and a long piece of duct tape held me out for three days.
I've also used duct tape, and electrical tape, on fingers when I mung them up on job sites.
posted by notsnot at 8:47 PM on January 29, 2006


The Straight Dope on the superglue-as-bandaids technique:
Is it safe to use ordinary household cyanoacrylate glue as a medical glue? According to Reference 7, most cyanoacrylate glues not designed specifically for medical use are formulated from methyl-2-cyanoacrylate, since it produces the strongest bond. Not only can such glues irritate the skin, during polymerization they can generate significant heat, to the point of causing skin burns. I gather this is a problem only if a large area of skin is affected. But to err on the side of safety, you should tell your brother-in-law he should only use medically-approved glue, not the ordinary kind.
posted by joshuaconner at 9:16 PM on January 29, 2006


I used the CVS brand flexible foam band-aids and theyre awesome. Or try the band-aid brand foam ones. They stretch and are comfortable to wear.
posted by deeman at 9:22 PM on January 29, 2006


Oh please, I use Krazy Glue on small cuts all the time and it works great; it certainly doesn't burn. If you want something else, get 3M VetBond which is basically surgical Krazy Glue but costs like 1/8 as much as NexCare or Dermabond, which are sold in one-application containers for no particularly good reason.

But to answer the original question: "Flexible Fabric" Band-Aids are the best, and are available in boxes of 100 for $4.39. Curad "Extreme Lengths" are also great - they're like five inches long and the gauze bit is near one end, so you can wrap them around and around your finger.

All this said, if you're really cut bad and bleeding freely, and headed for the emergency room as soon as you can get there, the best thing for it in the meantime is QuikClot, which is available now in "double packs". I keep a couple by the table saw, and a couple in the car, and a couple in my go bag.
posted by nicwolff at 11:41 PM on January 29, 2006


I'm fond of the Band-Aid Advanced Healing line. They're a plastic-ish kind of thing that looks and feels quite a lot like skin, and apparently breathes like skin too. It seals up a wound and lets it heal in a low-stress environment.

Everything I've used them on has healed up perfectly, and much faster than it would with a normal bandaid. No scarring, either. I usually change mine about once a week, but I'm not sure you even need to do that. I've never needed more than two. Even a fairly bad burn I got off an oven was just a slightly reddish spot on my skin after two weeks, and had disappeared completely a few weeks later. The last time I burned myself that badly, I healed slowly and had a bad scar... took fifteen years for it to fade.

If there's a drawback, it's that they don't work as well on small joints or areas that get a lot of skin motion. I'm (well!) past the age of skinning my knees, but I don't think these bandaids would work very well there. But for routine small wounds or burns on most areas of the body, these things are dynamite.
posted by Malor at 12:30 AM on January 30, 2006


The Nexcare bandages that are made of a thin "flesh-colored" foam-like substance are great. Excellent adhesion even through multiple showers and quite comfortable.
posted by xiojason at 10:44 AM on January 30, 2006


I love the Nexcare Waterproofs. The Band-Aid waterproofs (clear, diamond-shaped plastic) are the exact same things but cheaper in my market. They rock.

Duct tape also works well in a pinch, but masking tape burns and really doesn't stop bleeding. I had a dangerous tenure in the student council in high school.
posted by MeetMegan at 12:27 PM on January 30, 2006


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