3M Cavilon Durable Barrier Cream

NOTE TO THE READER: Any review of this cream will, of necessity, include more information about the problem it is helping to solve than it will information about the cream. In my case, the short, cut-to-the-chase review is that the Cavilon cream acted as a real and effective barrier, protecting my skin from damage done to it by repeated application and removal of medical adhesive tape. By providing that barrier, it stoped itching, reduced inflamation and made it possible for an amazing piece of medical technology to work as long as possible for me. That's the short of it. If this is really all you want to know, stop here. If, on the other hand, you want to understand why I needed this product to work as advertised and why I was so very, very pleased and grateful when it did, get something warm to drink, curl up in your favorite chair and settle in. While not a novel, reading this will take a bit of time. I had a five pound tumor removed from my lower abdomen last September 13 (just happened to be a Friday...of course). A week later, I popped the center staple of a very long incision. When the surgeon took a good look at the popped area, he made the decision to remove the rest of the staples holding the incision together. With the exception of the very end of each side of the wound, which had already begun to heal, the rest of the incision just opened up as he removed the rest of the staples. When he was done, there was an exposed hole in my body that measured seven and a half inches from one side, straight across the front of my body to the other side, five inches from the top edge of the wound to the bottom edge, at the middle of the incision, and three and a half to four inches deep inside the whole length of the incision. Huge. Gaping. Crater. Now, before you get all "that's impossible", I am a large woman, so there was lots of flesh available in and around the tumor he had to incise, as well as the size of the tumor itself. It was long, wide and had grown deep into my body. The surgeon faced the challenge of getting it ALL out. Hence, the long, deep incision. And, before you get all "Call the lawyers," it is my firm, unshakable belief that NO surgeon would have had success getting a wound that size, located where it opens into my body, to close successfully all by itself. THE SURGEON DID NOTHING WRONG and I have NO INTENTION of suing him. Just so we don't get all distracted by things that matter least. The surgeon sent me to the local hospital's Wound Care Center (WCC), where, on Friday, October 4, 2013, a wound vacuum* was applied to my wound and the healing began. Essential to the success of a wound vacuum is the quality of the seal created over and around the wound. It is the seal that makes possible keeping negative pressure in the vac moving fluids into the wound, then tbrough the special sponge packed inside the wound, through the tubing on the top of the dressing, out and into a canister attached to the side of the vacuum. The tape began to cause problems for me after the first few weeks on the wound vac. My skin got red and inflamed under the tape, it blistered and sometimes tore a little when the tape was removed, and both under and around the taped areas, my skin would get itchy-like-you-would-not-believe. This is when the Cavilon became essential - ESSENTIAL- to the health of my skin. And the health of my skin, and its non-reactive acceptance of the continued removal and reapplication of medical tape was critical to the healing process. Without a good seal around the wound, the vac couldn't draw well through the wound. Without keeping those fluids moving through the wound at a steady rate, healing slows, fluids leak, causing more irritation and skin damage, and the wound vacuum becomes less and less effective. Cavilon saved my skin from the ravages of tape application and removal and made possible a good, tight seal for the vac. Without the wound vacuum, Mother Nature has to close a wound that's failed to knit while stitched or stapled together. A wound the size mine was at the start could take between 18 and 24 months to close. A YEAR AND A HALF to a possible TWO YEARS to heal. Cavilon increased the effectiveness of the vacuum by keeping my skin from being damaged by the tape. The effective use of the vacuum reduced the vast majority of healing time to 13 WEEKS. A little more than THREE MONTHS. Versus most of two years. Now,just to be sure you really understand. Cavilon did not heal my wound. The wound vacuum did that job most of the way. Cavilon put a barrier between leaking fluids (during an occasional blowout on the side or bottom of the bandage), and adhesive tape on my skin. Both protections, provided by the Cavilon, facilitated the healing of my wound and health of my skin. The Cavilon Durable Barrier Cream 3355 was suggested to us by the plastic surgeon who monitored my progress and provided treatments every few weeks. The WCC didn't keep a supply of the cream on hand, so we found it, of course, on Amazon. Once we received it, it was applied to my skin BEFORE any tape was used, every time a bandage change was made. It comes out of the tube white and very thick. As you rub it in and around the area you want to protect, it becomes clear and shiny, so you still see it's there. It sits on top of the skin and is very slow to be absorbed. Applying tape to skin treated with Cavilon is no problem; tape sticks like the cream isn't even there. Again, the difference Cavilon makes is that it provides a barrier between the adhesive on the tape and your skin. When we applied the Cavilon to my skin, both at home and at the WCC, before any tape was applied, I found the cream lasted as an effective barrier between 30-36 hours. After that, my skin would begin to react to the adhesive and itch. I found that applying more cream to exposed skin around the edges of the tape helped calm the itching. Now, it took between two and three weeks of having the tape removed and reapplied every other day before my skin started to react - blister, inflame and itch. That's when the Cavilon really made a significant difference in keeping my skin healthy and able to bear the repeated removal and reapplication of various kinds of medical tape. Being able to get a good seal with the tape, which was applied over and around the bandaging, to the outside edges of my wound was what made the vac so effective. Skin breakdown would have slowed the whole process down, as any sores or tears in my skin anywhere the tape needed to be applied would have to be healed first, before the big wound in my body. Keeping skin as healthy as possible was the job the Cavilon did for me. I'm not saying there weren't problems, but as the wound got smaller, we could rest some areas while moving to tape pther areas. The whole time, both under tape and on my skin, Cavilon In thirteen weeks, the incision was reduced in size by 90%. It is now approximately: two inches side-to-side, an inch from the top edge to the bottom edge and three-quarters of an inch deep. I was put on a wound vac "vacation" until what's left of my wound can be evaluated by the plastic surgeon in about two weeks. The location of the wound is making getting a good and productive seal on the wound very difficult. But that's more about the vac and my anatomy than it is about the Cavilon. In the coming weeks, as nature takes over from technology, there will still be tape being applied to my increasingly crancky skin. Cavilon will make the difference between healthy skin, able to continue to receive tape, and itchy, inflammed and reactive skin. It has proven to be a true barrier between my skin and the tape, which holds the bandage in place. Cavilon is, in my experience, a really effective barrier cream. It keeps body fluids (blood, plasma, urine, bowel, nasal secreations, etc.) from irritating and breaking down skin. I'm going to use it on my nose to keep sneezing and wiping it during colds and allergy season from giving me the Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer look. It might help protect a baby's bottom from diaper rash, especially applied during every diaper change. I gave it to my daughters, both of whom have occasional bouts of eczema. I hope that Cavilon will help the healing by acting like a big bandage, a clearn cover between the excema and the rest of the world. * A wound vacuum is just what its name implies. The wound is packed - sometimes carefully stuffed - with a special, sterile sponge-like material, not unlike the packing used to protect electronic items in shipping. A special tape is applied over the packed wound, out onto the edges of the skin, creating a seal so the vacuum could actually "pull" fluids through the spongeand out into a canister, attached to the vacuum's side. Like a carpet vacuum, while it is on, negative pressure is applied to the wound area, which keeps fluids moving through the wound. This keeps anything from festering, turning rancid, or creating an environment ripe for infection to set in and encourages healing. In my humble opinion, it is a brilliant piece of technology which, in my case, worked a miracle on my body. It, and the excellent attention to hand care and cleanliness on the part of all the staff AND my husband, (who had the job of unpacking and bandaging the wound when more than three days passed between appojntments at the WCC), kept the incision infection-free to the date I'm writing this review. 1/9/2013