how long for abscess to pop

Antibiotics will not help an abscess. It is a sealed off area of infection. Waiting is very dangerous. If it breaks internally, you are at risk for sepsis and death. Is it the gi that wants to wait? When I have an abscess (and I've had about 10 of them) I call my surgeon not my gi. My gi can do nothing for me when I have an abscess. The abscess needs to be surgically drained asap. For it to be properly drained, the surgeon will take you in the operation room, locate the abscess, drain it, clean out the inside of it and then leave it open to heal from the inside out. My surgeon then inserts dye into the opeing and then looks in the rectum with an anoscope to see if there is an internal connection which would mean a fistula. If he finds a fistula he inserts a seton. It is an outpatient procedure.

Also, it says in your signature that you are waiting to start remicade because of the abscess. You can have remicade when you have an abscess. An abscess is part of the disease and isn't considered an infection that would stop you from getting remicade. He is definitely out of remission and needs to start remicade asap because of the abscess and suspected fistula. There is definitely active rectal crohns going on. Please don't wait for the abscess to pop on its own.

I don't think you're supposed to let an abscess pop on it's own.  If it starts draining or pops on the inside your husband could die. And I agree with the poster that said antibiotics will not help an abscess.

When I had mine it was on my stomach (it eventually turned into a fistula because it wasn't drained soon enough).  Anyways, I waited too long  to call my doctor, so when I got his on-call nurse she told me to come on in to the ER.  I went, they did xrays of it to see how big it was.  I was told they were going to make a small cut and place a tube to drain it and that it was easy peasy.... well I was waiting in the hall to get taken back into my room and  it popped.  I yelled for a nurse and it was like a scene from "Trauma life in the ER"  I was rushed to my room, basically cut open while I was wide awake, and they cleaned it out....that HURTS.  Then I had to be admitted for 4 days to make sure I didn't have an infection, plus then I needed an wound VAC (not fun) because the wound was so big, they didn't close it up incase of another infection happening.  It took about 4 months for it to actually heal.

I think you should go with your gut feeling and get a surgeon to take care of it.

You must have it surgically drained. I too have been through many of these. My GI advised me they have to be drained and cleaned out.  Don't waste time, get to a surgeon.

Steve

Mag... how long did you wait?? Please tell me it was longer than two weeks....

It was about then.  At first I didn't even know what was happening.  I just had a fever, and a spot on my stomach was real warm.  It took about a week for it to get really sore and red, that's when I ended up going to the ER.  Everyone is different though, the important thing is to get it taken care of asap.

Hubs saw the doc and he drained the abscess right then and there!  YAY!

He goes in next friday to get a a closer look and a possible fistulotomy.

Are those scary?

I have an abscess in my sigmoid bowel. I have no lump or hot spots. It is though I have had the abscess for some time (as in months) it is in one of my diverticular pouches. I have crohns and had been on infliximab (remicade). My crohns is under control but I cannot go back on the infliximab as this reduces my immune system andcan maken the abcess worse . I have had two weeks of antibiotics 1000mg per day, and it has deffo shrunk, I can go to the loo ok now and have much less pain. My stools often have red blood in them, I have some mild pain, but feel run down and lousy all of the time. I am due to see a surgeon tomorrow.

I am quite suprised that I continue to be able to go to work with only the odd sick day

Hi
Just thought I would tell the forum about my abscess which started out as a small zit three inches left of my belly botton. This small pimple was there for about 5-6 years and I have no skin conditions and no allergies..then for some reason last monday morning it grew to about 1-2 inches and red with pain.

My GP gave me antibiotics Flucloxallin and after 5 days I called into my local hospital beacause of the pain and was told to go home and keep taking the tablets until finished.

Today a full week had passed and this thing was the size of a golf ball in my stomach and the pain was worse still red with a peak on it and i was taking ibuprofen for the pain.

So I drove to the major hospital here in Belfast and within 1 hour it was surgically drained which made my toes curl but what a relief, I still need to keep it clean and now on Augmentim.

The doctor at the hopital said it was an abscess and a cyst behind it so it looks like Im not out of the woods yet.

If anyone has had this before please blogg.