I need some advice here.......

[Scrubby]

This is not really about me, it's about my partner who broke his ankle (lateral malleoulus) four days ago after falling off his motorbike. It's not a bad fracture, an avulsion type fracture. His foot (on the opposite side to the fracture where it caught under the bike) is pretty grazed, weeping and his entire foot is quite swollen still. They put a back slab on him to keep the foot immobile and we were told in ED that he would be having a full cast on in about a week to ten days. I have been giving him wound care, the wound isn't deep, but theres some moderate yellowish exudate.

We were informed today that he no longer needs to go to the fracture clinic to have a full cast, we should just go see the GP in three weeks. My problem here is that we are constantly worried about the backslab because it's quite fragile. It does move a little bit and i'm concerned that he will require a full cast or at least some type of follow up care. And i'm not really that confident in the wound care i'm giving here, i put some duoderm on it today with a water proof dressing covering it (same as they did in the ED) but i'm a theatre nurse, i don't really do any wound care at all.

Do you guys think i should see about going to another hospital, preferably the one where i work? I'm worried that he needs more than just a backslab after the wound has healed and the swelling has gone down. I feel that the hospital has just brushed us off. We were given no wound care instructions and now we're told that the GP should just manage this, with no X-rays to show them or anything. The GP won't be able to do anything without the proper paperwork....

[nyapa, RN]

Firstly, none of us can give medical advice. What I would suggest is that if you are unhappy with the treatment that you have received, that you do seek another opinion. Best of luck...

BTW scrubby, the other thing you could do is take the xrays (if the hospital will permit - bloody public hospitals get a bit upset about letting go of 'their property' - not sure if yours is public or private) to see a physiotherapist.

[traumaRUs, MSN, APRN]

Dar15 is right...only advice we can give is to seek a second opinion. Take care...