If you think you have an abscess

[guns01]

TweetIf you think you have an abscess this is for you
So I finally stopped being lazy and brought over one of my writings from TSC to help you guys out on the matter. This, like all my writings is an original, by me, from my base of knowledge being a medical professional. I hope that this is helpful to everyone here. More to come on other subjects of course.

Many people often come on the board asking about infections more often than not these people are complaining about some common symptoms leading them to think it maybe an infection. For ease of reading, I’ve made them into a list instead of actually talking about them for ease since most people won’t bother actually reading this if it is typed any other way. I make no apologies for how long this is, in the big scheme of things it is fairly short, I tried to keep it brief and informative and I made every effort to shorten it when possible in reality this is only about two pages worth of typing even with the lists.


Common signs that people complain about:

Redness
Soreness
Swelling
Heat from injection
Swelling in places other than injection (commonly in the arms or legs)
Pain

Generally a day or two after the injection, this is not an infection!!!

These however are more common symptoms of irritation, you just stuck a needle into a muscle and put a foreign substance into it, more often than not this is going to lead to an inflammatory response. These are common and happen for various reasons, commonly the injection leaked into the fat tissues, which are not as densely packed allowing the fluid to travel, this can and generally will cause swelling. It is not uncommon in quad shots when fluid has leaked to travel downwards due to gravity, this will cause redness, swelling and pain all the way to the knee in some cases. With practice and over time these will no longer be an issue for most shots you will do, these are more common for virgin muscles that are being shot for the first time, people using poor technique, or just a poor shot which unfortunately does happen from time to time.

Now let’s talk infection.

Common signs of an INFECTION:

A fever of 101+
Redness and swelling anywhere from 7-14 days after the injection
Sever pain (about a 7-8 on the 10 scale)
A hard lump or swelling at the injection site (again 7-14 days later)
Persistent swelling that continues (after a week or so if there is swelling take a pen and CAREFULLY draw around the border, watch it to see if it spreads or is actually decreasing)
A visible abscess forms

DO NOT!!! DRAIN ANYTHING YOURSELF!!!! IT CAN KILL YOU

Infections are very rare if you are following the basics and making sure everything is sterile so most of you will go your whole lives without ever needing to deal with this These are the general signs that you have an infection, notice that none of them set in anywhere near the actual time of injection. Infections unfortunately need time to form and the body needs to respond to the infection before you will ever have any idea you have one. This takes time and can take anywhere from 7 days to as long as two weeks, so when people complain after a day or two about the shot they did I can tell you right away it is not an infection. In fact you WILL know if you have an infection so you will not be coming here saying ‘I think I have an infection’, you will be coming on saying ‘I have a no shit infection right now’.

Like I said infections are rare but they do happen. Common sense applies but let’s go over once more things you can do to keep yourself from having an infection and so you can have peace of mind that your shot went well.

Prevention:
Use alcohol wipes to clean the tops of the vial and the injection site
Do not touch the needle to anything other than the site you are injecting or to the top of the vial that you are drawing from (Even with an alcohol wipe)
Always when drawing look at the oil to insure nothing is floating in it, it should be clear as crystal if there is anything other than air bubbles in it you do not want that in your body.
Make sure you let the alcohol evaporate before you start, the antibacterial properties of alcohol come from its evaporation not its application so it isn’t sterile until it dries and do NOT blow on it to dry it faster let it air dry.
Have a system, do the same thing over and over so you don’t forget anything and so you can check each step off your list, you can even write out a list if you are worried.

I recently had an instance with some of my home brew, some of my vials are fairly old so the rubber stoppers are starting to dry out, I was drawing some tren into my needle and because I always watch it and look at the oil (mostly because I like the way it looks I will be honest). I noticed a piece of the stopper had gotten sucked into the needle, after going back and forth with it I saved most of the gear and the stopper piece went into the sink instead of my body. This will cause some of the worst kinds of infections because foreign objects that are solid like that will not break down inside the body, the doctor will have to cut it out, it would be like finding a needle in a hay stack so be careful!!

Lastly, I want to say again common sense applies still, awhile back, a member came on here talking about a friend who went to the hospital and died because he had an infection, they wanted to amputate; amputation is the last option, period. He had to have waited a very long time for it to get to the point that they couldn’t even save the body part, I am all for natural selection but I hate the idea of anyone dying over something that can be prevented like this. Knowledge is power so know your body, know what to look for and know when to seek actual medical attention for it.

Please note that even though I am a Doctor I cannot and will not give medical advice, I have and will give you my opinion on issues; what I would do if I were in your shoes. I will point you in the right direction but it is against the law for me to offer any sort medical advice, it is also unethical and I am not that kind of person. That being said, stay safe and know what to look out for, when in doubt ask but a little research and an ounce of prevention will go a long way in making you feel confident in yourself and your abilities.

Antibiotics should be a last resort, you WILL KNOW if you need it, but even if that is the case my first and only real suggestion is seek medical attention, if the abscess is caused by something other than bacteria (read: stopper or other solid contaminant) the body has no way to fight it off, it needs to be removed that would be like trying to remove a needle from a haystack, it is not precise. But it is worth repeating, infections are rare, they do happen but they are quite rare if you follow proper procedures.

For those of you who actually bothered to read all of this, thank you it is unfortunate that you are the people that this article will probably not even apply to.

[Anabolic5150]

TweetThis should be a must read for everyone involved in this game, thank you guns!!!!!

[Ezskanken]

TweetGreat read brother, look forward to more of your postings like this. Very informative, and like Anabolic said, a must read for all...

[Dieseljimmy]

TweetGood read...
I have a sterile abscess on my chest for about a year. Not a big issue but when I get lean it become appearant. Should I proceed as I have and leave it alone or should I have it drained.its always in the back of my mind on chest days that the thing is going to pop

[6p6]

TweetGreat read...question guns? Over my decade and a half of using AAS I've gotten probably 4-5 boil or welt like happenings about 3-6 inches from an injections site. Site gets hot, red, swelling, no fever but area is tender slightly painful...each time I've lanced it myself gotten nasty fluid out of it and they go away. On one I actually had it leave an indentation in my skin (this one may have been a brown recluse spider bite). I have some medical training so the lancing has never been an issue for me. I believe I've fixed these before they became infections? Any experience with what I'm talking about an advise? I'm sure I'm not the only one who has this experience...

[guns01]

Tweetif it wasnt right where the injection took place it could have been a number of things. do you shave your body hair? that usually causes a ton of issues with infected hairs (trust me i had one try to kill me last year) the spider bite, i had one on the outside of my quad last year and thought it was a bad hit as well, few inches off but it turned out to be a spider bite and it left an indent as well. only way it is caused by a bad injection and is forming a pocket of iinfection is if you missed the muscle completely and the oil pocket moved down some. i dont think that happens to often. if you have all the symptoms and a fever i would head in to see the doc. like i said i had a hair last year that almost killed my dumb ass cause i let it go even though i knew better

[guns01]

Tweet

Good read...
I have a sterile abscess on my chest for about a year. Not a big issue but when I get lean it become appearant. Should I proceed as I have and leave it alone or should I have it drained.its always in the back of my mind on chest days that the thing is going to pop

if it has been there that long man it is prob scare tissue or a scist. unless you didnt get any of the oil into the muscle at all it would have eventually been absorbed by now. same thing with in between the muscle and skin it would have absorbed slowly but would have eventually went away. may want to get that checked out though just in case it is a bad lympth node or something of that nature

[BABY1]

TweetFuzo had one in his glute years ago! It made hims so sick that he was in the hospital for 5 days in much pain. They were concerned about sepsis and the infection getting to the bone and that would have been no good. Anyway, when he got out, he had to have a drain in there for 2 weeks. Very scary!

[guns01]

Tweet

Fuzo had one in his glute years ago! It made hims so sick that he was in the hospital for 5 days in much pain. They were concerned about sepsis and the infection getting to the bone and that would have been no good. Anyway, when he got out, he had to have a drain in there for 2 weeks. Very scary!

that is what the backed up hair i had did. it was a zit looking thing one day and then i woke up and it was bigger than a softball. i let it go for about 3 days and it damn near killed my stupid ass. you want to talk about pain. they dont numb up an infection so i got sliced probed and squeezed by my buddy with nothing. it sucked very very badly to say the least.

[6p6]

Tweetgreat post guns...this is the kind of topics that people need...reality...spent 40 min with an acquaintance yesterday trying to show him proper techniques for quad shots since he was ****ing them up so bad...

I would also add to this DMSO is king...put that on post shot on quads/shoulders every times...start feeling something weird in the skin...DMSO...best solvent out there...cures everything! jk

[omni]

TweetPriceless info. Before the internet most of us didn't know what was going on and nobody I knew would go to the doctor.