United Brachial Plexus Network, Inc.

It was torture removing the tape to replace Owen's gauze on his neck last night. I was so hurt and upset that I had to put my own son through this! The tape we received was not supposed to stick that much, but after a little sweat it was stuck like superglue. I tried everything I could think of to gentley remove it and it was the most painful experience he has been through.

I immediately went to the pharmacy and bought all types of things like No Hurt Tape, ace bandage, etc. I vowed never to put him through that again!

What I did was use the No Hurt Roll of Tape. I wrapped it under his uninjured armpit and around the side of his neck to hold the gauze in place. It works well and it is easy to replace everyday.

I felt so awful for having to hurt him last night. I'm still trying to get over it. Has anyone else come up with a better way to avoid taping to the skin?

The tacaderm is the worst! In the hospital they gave us some of that hand sanitizing foam to use. You just put a little around the edges and work it up a little at a time. The foam disolves the adhesive. It's a slow process but really helped. Also I made sure Elizabeth had tylenol.
good luck,
Jenny

Roy - when we were at TCH for primary a few of the nurses really taped Maia up... then one night a male nurse came in and said - there is no way you need all of this tape and he showed us a new way to tape.

He took the gauze pad- put it on the incision area

and took ONE piece of tape and it went right through the middle of gauze pad so that there was 1/2" on on side on the skin and 1/2" on the other side on the skin. It worked great and there was no problem with it at all.

We use Nexcare Advanced Holding Tape for Maia - she has eczema and very sensitive skin and it comes off nicely. You remove the skin from the tape - not tape from the skin.

Good luck - hope it goes better for you and Owen tonight!

-francine

Hannah had a terrible time with the tape as well. We used the tape removal swabs from TCH. It didn't smell the best, but it worked great on the tape. We also started putting small amounts of tape on the corners of the gauze only. After a week we just stopped dressing it completly.

The best way I found was to put your (clean) finger on the skin close to the tape and gently push the skin away as you slowly pull on the tape.

I think most kids go through this.

Good luck.

We had the same problem with Cassidy. What we ended up doing was using Sterile Rolls of Gauze. We used a Gauze pad - and then wrapped her up like a mummy with rolled gauze - that way we could only tape to the gauze and not her skin. It worked out wonderfully. When we had to take it off - it came off easily - stayed in place - and worked out great for us.

Also think about CoBan. It only sticks to itself - so you don't have to worry about tape at all. I think it's called Keflex at the pharmacy!

Hope all is going well!
ANita

We used the one strip method Francine mentioned. I got the tape from our physical therapist. It was semi-transparent and somewhat stretchy. It held well yet came off easy. Jake has sensitive skin too and this worked out well.

I think we have all gone through the tape wars. With Gabrielle I made kind-of a collar with large gauze pads and rolled gauze. I never put the tape directly on her skin. When we went for her check up the nurese had me show her how to do it. She said she had never seen anything like it and was amazed at how well Gabrielle was healing NO INFECTIONS, Thank God. Good luck, feel free to email me if you want more details on the Gabrielle Collar.