Controlled prospective trial of wound management in elective hand surgery.

A total of 33 consecutive patients undergoing elective hand operations were randomly allocated 5 days after the operation either to have all dressings discarded or to continue with an occlusive bandage for a further 2 weeks. Assessments at 2 and 6 weeks showed that wound healing, hand function, symptoms and complications were identical in both groups. It was concluded that for selected patients early removal of hand dressings after surgery does not have any deleterious effects.